Woman who miscarries dies days after baby shower due to state abortion ban, report says

(Gray News) – An 18-year-old woman in Texas who suffered a miscarriage died after the state’s ban on abortion prevented her from receiving life-saving medical care.

On October 28, 2023, Nevaeh Crain woke up with a headache on the morning of her baby shower.

A Texas woman who suffered a miscarriage died after the state's abortion ban prevented her from... — A woman in Texas who suffered a miscarriage died after the state’s ban on abortion prevented her from receiving life-saving medical care.(Source: GoFundMe)

Not long after, Crain developed a fever, followed by nausea and vomiting.

She opened presents and struggled through her baby shower. But by 3 p.m., her family decided to take her to the emergency room.

Crain’s boyfriend took her to a hospital where they sat in the waiting room for nearly four hours.

At the first hospital she was diagnosed with strep throat, but her sharp abdominal cramps were not investigated. She was discharged and prescribed antibiotics, ProPublica reported.

In the middle of the night, Crain woke her mother complaining of severe stomach pains, so she drove her daughter to the hospital.

At the second hospital she tested positive for sepsis. But doctors said her six-month fetus had a heartbeat and Crain was fine to leave. according to the outlet.

After many hours of IV fluids, one dose of antibiotics and some Tylenol, Crain’s fever did not go down.

Her heart rate also remained elevated and the fetal heart rate was abnormally fast.

The doctor said Crain had strep and a urinary tract infection, wrote a prescription and discharged her.

When Crain got home, she was still in pain. She told her mother that she had to pee, but she noticed that there was blood in her underwear.

The blood confirmed her mother’s instinct that she was having a miscarriage.

The next morning they were back at another hospital where Crain kept saying she was going to faint.

Medical staff started Crain on IV antibiotics and the gynecologist on call also reported that she could not find a fetal heartbeat at that time.

Ultimately, doctors performed a second ultrasound to “confirm the death of the fetus.”

At the time, Crain was unable to sign consent forms due to “extreme pain,” so her mother signed a release to allow her daughter to have an unplanned C-section.

The almost total ban on abortion in Texas meant that the doctors could do nothing to remove the non-viable fetus unless Crain’s life was in danger.

She would either have to get so sick that the doctors could intervene, or she would have a miscarriage herself.

However, the doctors decided that it was now too dangerous. Doctors suspected she was bleeding internally after developing a dangerous complication of sepsis disseminated intravascular coagulation.

Crain died hours later in the ICU.

According to ProPublicawas there any chance that Crain could have stayed pregnant. If she had needed an early delivery, the hospital was well equipped to care for the baby.

If the infection had gone too far, terminating the pregnancy might have been necessary to save Crain.

Crain is one of at least two Texas women who died under the state’s abortion ban.