The reversal of Roe v. Wade has not led to catastrophic health outcomes as abortion activists claimed, a pro-choice professor and maternal fetal medicine specialist admitted recently.

Professor David Hackney says when it comes to maternal mortality, “a net increase has not been clearly identified” following the 2022 Supreme Court decision Dobbs v. Jackson.

The Case Western University professor, writing in STATNews, also debunks the claim OB/GYNs would flee pro-life states.

“Collectively across the country, recent estimates have identified net changes of zero or only 1%-2% for OB-GYNs moving from restrictive to unrestrictive locations,” Hackney says. “Though individual physicians have relocated in response to changing laws, the nationwide exodus that was feared has not occurred.”

Hackney should also have mentioned that there is no proof medical students are avoiding pro-life states, as reported multiple times by the College Fix.

Despite acknowledging some inconvenient truths, Hackney also makes several questionable claims in his essay. For example, he argues that “infant mortality has risen,” which he blames on the “cruelty” of abortion bans that lead to babies being born with “congenital or genetic anomalies.” He argues it is cruel to have a woman deliver a baby who may only survive a few minutes or hours.

“In short, the pro-life laws are preventing children with congenital defects from being aborted,” Professor Michael New explains in National Review.

Hackney still supports the direct and intentional killing of innocent preborn babies.

“Bans need not increase or decrease public health measures for opposition, but are opposed as misogynistic violations of autonomy,” he argues.

“When arguments are based on consequences, we then argue about data when we should be fighting for freedoms,” he writes. Hackney is saying abortion advocates should argue for the freedom to kill babies in the womb based on morality, not studies.

Here, pro-life activists can find common ground: The issue of abortion is one of morality. There is no academic study that could ever “prove” it is good to kill babies in the womb.

Abortion is the intentional killing of an innocent human being. From the moment of conception, a human has a natural right to life. The Christian argument would be that God creates all life, and it is wrong to take the life of an innocent person.

But even a non-theist could agree that a society functions best when it does not label some human beings as deserving of protection while allowing others to be discarded.

Professor Hackney is on the right path by acknowledging the abortion debate is ultimately one about morality. Now he just needs to get on the right side and acknowledge what he must know to be true given his medical background: that inside a woman is not a blob of tissues or a “choice,” but a living human being who is therefore deserving of complete legal protection.