Becky Currie said Wednesday that when she filed the Gestational Age Act with the Mississippi House of Representatives in 2018, she had no idea that the bill was the beginning of the end for unrestricted abortion in the United States.
“A little, small nurse from here overturned Roe v. Wade,” said Currie, a Republican lawmaker from Brookhaven who graduated from McComb High School in 1975. “Who’d have thought? It shows you can accomplish things.”
Currie, speaking to the McComb Rotary Club, said the bill was the successor to one that outlawed abortion after 19 weeks. When a lawsuit prevented that from taking effect, she decided to file one that lowered the permissible date to 15 weeks.
She said her work with Dr. Edsel Stewart years ago in McComb played a role in that.
Stewart was treating a mother whose life was at risk, forcing him to end the pregnancy at 15 weeks. But the baby survived the procedure for a short time.
“It stuck with me,” Currie said. Noting that 15 weeks is 31⁄2 months, she added, “That’s when babies feel pain, that’s when they suck their thumbs, they have all their major organs.”
The U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June. Currie said the next issue is, “Now, what do we do?”
“There’s no abortion in the state of Mississippi, which I’m proud to say,” she said. “But what do we do? There will be a lot of babies born — let’s be realistic about that — that will not be wanted.”
Estimates are that 3,000 to 5,000 Mississippi women per year who previously would consider abortion now will give birth. Currie said some of these women will need more help from the state, and suggested ways to provide it.
“We’re just going to turn around and say, ‘good luck?’ ” she asked. “I don’t believe that’s what we’re supposed to do.”
She said the state has cut a number of medical services it used to provide at county Health Department offices. She believes restoring those would be relatively inexpensive and help women and children who cannot afford medical care.
“My plan is to make sure our local health departments are up and running again like they were,” she said. “We’ve got to do something besides say, ‘Good luck, hope everything goes well.’ It is our responsibility to take care of women and children.”
She said “budgets were crazy” when Republicans took full executive and legislative control of state government in 2011, and the party got state finances back in line. But health care cuts hit hardest at the local level.
“The services are not there,” she said. “We may have to have a few more people, but look at the long run.”
Currie also said the state should consider helping women who cannot afford it obtain birth control, reasoning that preventing pregnancies is a lot cheaper than paying to help raise children for 19 years.
She added that the state could use a single nurse practitioner to provide care at health department offices in up to five counties.
She did not estimate a cost, but noted that the state has at least $2 billion in extra cash due to much higher-than-expected tax revenues and federal coronavirus relief money.
“We have the money to make sure people are taken care of,” she said. “We just need to make sure we do the smart thing and the right thing.
“I know people are concerned about roads and bridges, but we have given them a ton of money. I would hate for this money not to be spent on women and children. In a few years, we are going to have a huge problem. ... I just don’t want us to spend all of this money on roads and bridges.”
Currie said the state also could consider expanding Medicaid, but added, “A lot of conservative Republicans, and I feel like I’m one of that crowd, don’t want to look at it because it has the name Obamacare. We’ve had several presidents since then.”
She said anyone who wants to assist a charity should consider giving diapers for a crisis pregnancy center to distribute.
“We want people to have this baby that’s a gift from God,” she said. “But they’re out there on their own.”
She also warned that hospitals in the state are at risk of closing if they don’t get financial help.
“It is awful what they’re going through,” she said. “If we don’t do something, health care as we know it won’t be here.”
Currie, in her fourth term, continues to work as a nurse and said she is running for re-election in 2023.
