Leaders of the House Energy and Commerce Committee have set a May 22 deadline in which they expect public health officials from all 50 states and Washington, D.C., to provide them with "details on state licensing of abortion clinics and providers, information on revoked licenses, state inspections of clinics and disciplinary actions" so they can "examine how each state regulates and monitors abortion clinics and protects the health and safety of women," the Christian Post reports. Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), vice chairman of the committee, who signed the letter to the public health officials along with her Republican colleagues on the committee, said: "Planned Parenthood called Gosnell's 'House of Horrors' an 'outlier,' but we're learning Gosnell is not an aberration. They were approached by women who complained about the disgusting conditions at Gosnell's facility, and they didn't report it. When the Pennsylvania Department of Health found out about Gosnell, they sat on their hands and the media was silent. Now we're discovering that other big abortion businesses refuse to give medical treatment to babies who survive botched abortions and we're finding out the truth from former pro-choice nurses who called their own Gosnell-like clinics 'ridiculously unsafe.'" On Wednesday, Blackburn introduced H. Res. 206, a resolution calling on members of the House to review the public policies that led to illegal abortion practices, such as those discovered at Gosnell's Philadelphia clinic. The resolution states that "Congress and States should gather information about and correct abusive, unsanitary and illegal abortion practices and the interstate referral of women and girls to facilities engaged in dangerous or illegal second- and third-trimester procedures."
