OP-ED: What are Canadians not told about abortion complications?
Richard Dur writes, "We are told that abortion is safe. Routine, even. Like any other procedure funded by taxpayers."
By: Richard Dur
Richard Dur is the executive director of Prolife Alberta
It begins the same way it always does. A procedure they’ve done many times. The movements practiced, almost automatic. No hesitation. No doubt.
Until there is.
It’s small at first. A slip, something meets resistance where there should be none. Something is off.
A quick glance between doctor and nurse – returned, then held. No one says it. They don’t need to. Because the atmosphere has changed. You can feel it.
What was supposed to proceed cleanly, predictably, has slipped – just enough to be felt before it’s understood. Then it’s understood.
And the room seems to narrow.
Voices drop. The kind of voices people use when they don’t want the moment to spread.
A correction is attempted. Then another. The procedure is no longer the focus. Now the patient, still in stirrups, is.
She wasn’t supposed to become the problem. That part – her problem as the boyfriend called it – was already dealt with. Removed. Disposed of without ceremony, just as expected.
But this wasn’t supposed to happen to her. A miss. Something where it shouldn’t be. Something that won’t stop.
The nurse steps back, shuffles to the cork board. A sheet is tacked there – the kind of thing you don’t notice unless you need it.
They need it.
A finger moves down the list. Stops. The number is dialed. Carefully. Deliberately. As if haste might make it worse. It isn’t 911. That would be too loud. Too public. (As if it isn’t already.)
A pause.
Then, almost as an afterthought, though it isn’t, a request: No lights. No sirens. Just come.
Outside, nothing appears to have changed. The street carries on as it always does. Life moves without interruption beyond their walls.
An ambulance. No lights. No siren. Just present.
And in the same frame, almost absurdly, a Canada Post vehicle: parked, unremarkable, on time. Just another ordinary day. Another stop. Another routine delivery.
But inside, nothing feels ordinary anymore. No deliveries (Not of that kind, anyway. Not here.) Only containment. For now…
At this time, we do not know why emergency services were called. But we know that they were.
Which raises a simple question: How often does this happen?
We are told that abortion is safe. Routine, even. Like any other procedure funded by taxpayers. “Just another medical procedure.” And yet there is nothing truly “medical” about preforming a D&C or a D&E on a living fetus – a human being in the early stages of development.
And unlike most other physicians – who treat the sick or injured, the overwhelming majority of an abortionist’s patients are young, strong, and in good health.
That matters.
Because when a procedure is performed on someone who is otherwise healthy – and is presented as “simple” and “virtually without risk”– the standard of care should be higher, not lower.
And yet, when something does go wrong, there is no clear window into what happened, how often it happens, or what follows.
In most areas of medicine, complications are tracked. Outcomes are studied. Incidents are reviewed, not to expose patients but to ensure accountability.
Here, that visibility is far less clear.
And when risk becomes reality, systems are supposed to respond. With reporting. With oversight. With transparency. With accountability.
So that the public, not just insiders, can understand whether standards are being met.
Instead, what we have is a glimpse.
An ambulance. No explanation. A system that readily offers assurances – but consistently lobbies to hinder visibility and accountability.
Something happened here. The “silent siren treatment?”
No one is asking for private medical details.
But when emergency services are called to a facility performing procedures with known risks, the public has a legitimate interest in knowing: How often? Under what circumstances? And with what oversight?
Until those questions are answered, the silence is not reassuring. It’s revealing.
