Abortion bills sponsored by two Lynchburg-area legislators won approval in a House subcommittee Wednesday.
The sponsors were Del. Kathy Byron, R-Campbell County, and Del. Ben Cline, R-Rockbridge County.
A bill requiring that ultrasound images be used to determine the gestational age of a fetus passed the Criminal Law subcommittee of the House Courts of Justice Committee.
Although no committee member voted against the bill, sponsored by Byron, it had public opposition as well as support.
Jessica Honke, representing Planned Parenthood, said the bill was medically unnecessary and placed a barrier between a woman and her physician under the 24-hour period for informed consent that state law already requires before an abortion can be performed.
Also, Honke said, viewing an ultrasound "is a personal decision that should be made by a woman in consultation with her health care provider."
Support for Byron’s bill came from Eric Adcock, associate director of the Virginia Catholic Conference. Adcock said the bill would improve Virginia’s informed consent measures, and that a University of Michigan study showed that an ultrasound combined with other practices was the most accurate way to determine the development stage of a fetus.
Byron told the committee that a Virginia woman died as a result of an abortion in 1998 partly because of an incorrect estimate of the fetus’ age. The bill would provide an added safety measure, she said.
Virginia law already requires that second-trimester abortions be performed in hospitals rather than clinics, and allows abortions after the second trimester only in limited circumstances.
Cline’s bill would also add to information provided to pregnant women during the informed-consent phase of abortion. The bill would require a doctor to tell the woman that fetuses can feel pain after 20 weeks of gestation, and that anesthesia for the baby is available upon request.
The bill would let doctors decide not to provide the information if they believe it would be a significant risk to the woman.
Honke, of Planned Parenthood, spoke against Cline’s bill as well.
"The legislation is neither clinically proven nor scientifically sound," Honke said, and could in-ject the opinion of a single physician into law.
The subcommittee approved it on a 7-2 show of hands.
Both bills were reported to the full Courts of Justice Committee.
The bills were approved last year by the House of Delegates, but they died in a Senate committee.
