Baby born to brain-dead Georgia woman kept alive because of abortion law
The baby of a brain-dead Georgia woman kept alive because of her state’s restrictive abortion laws has been born prematurely by caesarean delivery. Doctors will remove the woman from life support on Tuesday, June 17.
Adriana Smith, a nurse who turned 31 on Sunday, June 15, was declared brain-dead on Feb. 19 at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta. She was eight weeks pregnant at the time. Doctors reportedly told Smith’s family they could not perform an abortion because Georgia law allows the procedure after the sixth week of pregnancy only to protect a woman’s life or health, in cases of rape or incest, or when there are known fetal anomalies.
A baby named Chance
Smith’s son, named Chance, was born early on Friday, June 13, according to Smith’s family. He was 1 pound, 13 ounces at birth and is in the hospital’s neonatal intensive care unit.
“He’s expected to be OK,” Smith’s mother, April Newkirk, told WXIA-TV in Atlanta. “He’s just fighting. We just want prayers for him. Just keep praying for him. He’s here now.”
Doctors had intended to deliver the baby in the 32nd week of gestation but decided last week to perform an emergency C-section.
In May, doctors determined the fetus had fluid on the brain, Newkirk said. “He may be blind, may not be able to walk, may not survive once he’s born,” she said in May.
Dispute over abortion law
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Georgia’s Living Infants Fairness and Equality, or “LIFE,” Act bans abortions after a fetal heartbeat can be detected, usually about the sixth week of pregnancy.
Smith went to a different hospital on Feb. 18 with a severe headache. She was given medication and sent home. The following day, she arrived at the Emory hospital’s emergency room in distress. A CT scan showed blood clots on the brain that could not be treated, and doctors declared her brain-dead.
The hospital has offered no detailed explanation of why its doctors kept Smith on life support. A spokeswoman said last month that the hospital “uses consensus from clinical experts, medical literature, and legal guidance to support our providers as they make individualized treatment recommendations in compliance with Georgia’s abortion laws and all other applicable laws.”
The hospital’s interpretation of the state’s Living Infants Fairness and Equality, or “LIFE,” Act was disputed by state officials. Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, a Republican, signed the act into law in 2019, but it did not take effect until after the Supreme Court overturned the landmark Roe v. Wade decision in 2022.
A spokeswoman for Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr, a Republican running to succeed Kemp as governor in 2026, has said the law does not require medical professionals to keep a pregnant woman on life support after brain death. Removing life support does not equate to an abortion, the spokeswoman, Kara Murray, said.
‘I shouldn’t be burying my daughter’
Newkirk, Smith’s mother, told the Atlanta television station she still believes the family should have been allowed to withdraw life support earlier.
“I think all women should have a choice about their body,” Newkirk said. “And I think I want people to know that.”
The next phase in her family’s ordeal is saying goodbye to Smith, who was also the mother of a 7-year-old boy.
“It’s kind of hard, you know,” Newkirk said. “It’s hard to process. I’m her mother. I shouldn’t be burying my daughter. My daughter should be burying me.”
“If I could say one more thing to her,” Newkirk added, “I guess I would tell her that I love her and that she was a great daughter.”
Ella Rae Greene, Editor In Chief
