Madison Surgery Center
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The Madison Surgery Center, located at 1 S. Park St., is an outpatient surgery center run jointly by the University of Wisconsin Medical Foundation, UW Hospital and Clinics and Meriter Hospital.
It is governed by the UW Hospitals and Clinics Authority Board, which is composed of members from each of the hospitals along with seven representatives from UW.
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Second trimester abortions
Controversy arose in late 2008 when the Madison Surgery Center began to move toward offering second-trimester abortions as one of its services.
Proposed abortion clinic
The proposal to implement a second-trimester abortion clinic was sparked by the retirement of Madison’s Planned Parenthood physician Dennis Christensen in December 2008, who was the only physician in the Madison area who performed second-trimester abortions. After he left his profession, Madison Surgery Center decided to fill the empty space in order to provide the service to the local community.
On Feb. 4, 2009, the UW Hospitals and Clinics Authority Board voted in an 11-3 decision to support the proposed abortion clinic. This was the third in a set of four approvals needed before going forward with the clinic, including Meriter Hospital and UW Hospital’s doctor group,s who both voted in favor.
The final approval came four days later on Feb. 8, 2009, when the Madison Surgery Center board voted unanimously in favor of the creation of the abortion clinic.
The controversy continued April 24, 2009 when the Wisconsin state Senate approved existing members—retired businessman Roger Axtell and Quarles & Brady Partner Mike Weiden—to the UW Hospitals and Clinics Authority Board in a 17-15 decision, a decision which made many anti-abortion activists angry as they had previously voted in favor of the proposed abortion clinic.
Services
More than a year after it was granted approval, the Madison Surgery Center has still yet to begin performing second-trimester abortions.
In its proposal, Madison Surgery Center said it will offer abortions on women up to 22 weeks pregnant, maintaining Madison’s status as one of four cities in Wisconsin to offer second-trimester abortions.
UW Health authorities have said the majority of abortions performed at the center will be on women who have difficulty affording health care, estimating about 125 abortions per year.
Controversy
Several anti-abortion organizations across Wisconsin have expressed outrage against Madison Surgery Center’s proposal, including the Alliance Defense Fund, Wisconsin Right to Life and Pro-Life Wisconsin.
Many concerns were raised by the groups outside of their disagreement with the morality of ending a human life through abortion. This includes using public funding to fund the abortions, coercing doctors into performing the abortions against their will and the possibility of the hospital using the fetuses for research by the university or by other researchers.
NARAL Pro-Choice Wisconsin, on the other hand, has been an avid supporter of Madison Surgery Center’s effort to provide second trimester abortions to the Madison area.
Their main argument stems from the fact that only two other cities in Wisconsin offer second trimester abortions—Milwaukee and Appleton—and losing Madison would decrease a woman’s access to health care and the already long waits women go through to get this service.
External links
Notable articles
- MSC considers clinic
- Motives under scrutiny
- UW authority board approves clinic
- MSC board approves clinic
- Senate OKs seats
