WASHINGTON - U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett, D-Dallas, wants to know why a Texas committee opted not to conduct in-depth investigations of pregnancy-related deaths from 2022 and 2023.
Crockett and several other House Democrats wrote Thursday to Jennifer Shuford, commissioner of the Texas Department of State Health Services, requesting a briefing by Jan. 2 about the decision.
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Investigative news outlet ProPublica has identified several pregnant women in Texas who died after they couldn't access timely reproductive care. Crockett accused Texas Republicans of trying to bury their stories.
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"We are demanding the Texas Department of State Health Services explain its reasoning behind its decision to stop reviewing maternal mortality deaths in the years following their abortion ban," Crockett said in a news release. "The people of Texas deserve the truth."
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Texas Department of State Health Services officials did not respond Friday to an emailed request for comment.
At issue is the 23-member Texas Maternal Mortality and Morbidity Review Committee and its decision to skip over the two years in question and move on to reviewing 2024 cases in depth.
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That decision raised concern given the timing of the tight abortion restrictions adopted by the state.
In 2021, Texas enacted a ban on abortion as early as six weeks into pregnancy, followed by a near-total ban on abortion a year later.
The law has an exception allowing abortions in life-threatening situations, but the scope of that exception has been the subject of continuing confusion for some medical providers.
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Some committee members have said the decision was not politically motivated and described it as an attempt to catch up on a backlog of data and provide more up-to-date reviews of maternal deaths.
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Committee chair Dr. Carla Ortique has said the committee previously skipped over years to be more contemporary.
The department still looks at data from skipped years, but the committee will not conduct its usual in-depth investigations.
Advocates and medical providers have expressed concerns that skipping those investigations will hamper the state's ability to understand the impact of the state's abortion ban.
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The lawmakers echoed those concerns in their letter.
"We are concerned that the MMMRC is choosing to forego data review for the period after Texas imposed these restrictions on abortion due to a chilling effect on reproductive care in Texas that means fewer women are able to access emergency, life-saving reproductive health care services," Crockett and her fellow House members wrote in their letter.
They pointed to a state requirement that the committee study and review "trends, rates, or disparities in pregnancy-related deaths and severe maternal morbidity."
They noted state and local review committees are the "gold standard" for understanding the drivers of maternal mortality and pregnancy complications, along with associated disparities.
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"As the first and largest state to implement a strict abortion ban, Texas can offer extensive insight into the effect of abortion bans," they wrote. "Ignoring pregnancy-related deaths during one of the deadliest periods in Texas for pregnant women directly contradicts MMMRC's statutorily required mission of eliminating preventable maternal deaths in Texas."