The proposed law requiring abortion clinics to either bury or cremate fetal remains got its first hearing in a House committee.
The bill is in response to an investigation by Attorney General Mike DeWine, which found that Ohio’s Planned Parenthood clinics were not selling fetal parts but some remains did end up in landfills.
Republican Representative Kyle Koehler of Springfield says that discovery moved him to sponsor legislation to require the burial or cremation of an aborted fetus.
“Somehow being able to tell my children that the reports of selling baby body parts are possibly not true because the actual truth is that they may be throwing them into Ohio landfills does not make me feel any better,” he said.
NARAL Pro-Choice Ohio says requiring a woman to choose a type of disposal forces her to have a conversation with her doctor that she might not want to have.