The debate about the current health care reform legislation in Congress has received a lot of media attention and is an important issue: it will serve to define the relationship between health care and abortion.  Is abortion just another medical procedure morally equivalent to having one’s tonsils taken out?  Many physicians in the 19^th century did not think so.  In fact, a large number of them worked diligently to curtail abortion. 

Dr. Frederick Dyer wrote a book titled The Physicians’ Crusade Against Abortion that shares the history of caring physicians who believed in defending life.  During the 19^th century, many physicians became alarmed by the incidence of abortion.  Dr. Horatio Storer started what is referred to as the “physicians’ crusade against abortion.” Dr. Storer and many of his colleagues lobbied state legislatures and successfully encouraged the passage of laws restricting abortion, many of which remained intact until Roe v. Wade in 1973.  The political arena was not the only place in which pro-life physicians spoke out for life.  According to Dyer, these physicians also worked to inform women that life begins at conception and to persuade them to continue their pregnancies.  According to Dyer, many women who intended to terminate their pregnancies chose life because of the work of Dr. Storer and his followers.

Dr. Frederick Dyer has also written a biography of Horatio Storer, titled Champion of Women and the Unborn: Horatio Robinson Storer, M.D.  In addition to fighting for the lives of unborn children, Storer was one of the first people to specialize in treating women’s diseases and had a great impact on the field of gynecology.  This biography provides many details about Storer’s life from his early childhood to his medical career to his struggles with illness late in life. 

Many currently practicing physicians and healthcare professionals follow in the footsteps of Dr. Storer and his colleagues- they believe that elective abortion is the unjust ending of a human being’s life.  Any health care reform should respect the consciences of pro-life healthcare professionals and not force them to perform or refer for procedures to which they are morally opposed.