The Boulder Abortion Clinic, one of the most controversial and long-standing late-term abortion facilities in the United States, has officially closed its doors after five decades in operation, according to a report by the Associated Press.
Dr. Warren Hern, the 87-year-old founder and one of the only abortion providers in the country who performed abortions beyond 28 weeks of pregnancy, confirmed the clinic’s closure last month, citing financial difficulties and the lack of a successor to take over his practice.
“It became impossible to continue, but closing is one of the most painful decisions of my life,” Hern said.
Hern’s clinic was among a tiny handful in the country to provide abortions in the third trimester — even up to and beyond 32 weeks in certain cases. Despite national debate and increasing restrictions in many states following the 2022 reversal of Roe v. Wade, Colorado remained one of the few states without any gestational limit on abortion.
Hern said that many of his patients struggled to afford the roughly $10,000 cost of late-term procedures, which are often not covered by insurance. The decline in long-time private donors, many of whom supported his work for decades, also contributed to the decision.
He admitted he had hoped someone would take over the clinic, but that never happened.
“I had to make a decision really, you know, sort of on the basis of the situation at the moment that we couldn’t continue,” Hern explained. “It was very, very painful. I see this as my personal failure.”
In a 2023 interview with The Atlantic, Hern acknowledged performing abortions as late as 35 weeks. One woman described her abortion at that stage as “euthanasia” after a prenatal diagnosis of brain abnormalities. Hern reportedly told the woman, “It’s your choice,” and performed the procedure.
But according to The Atlantic, fetal abnormalities were not the only reasons for these late abortions. Hern estimated that at least half of the late-term abortions he performed were not related to medical diagnoses.
“The reason doesn’t really matter to Hern,” the article stated, noting his belief that a baby’s viability is based more on a woman’s willingness to carry the pregnancy than gestational age.
Hern even admitted to performing abortions for sex selection on two occasions and acknowledged in the 1970s that some of the fetuses removed at 15 or 16 weeks had still-beating hearts when removed from the womb.
Late-term abortions represent a small fraction of total abortions in the U.S., but they remain one of the most hotly debated aspects of the abortion issue.
While pro-choice advocates argue that such procedures are often driven by heartbreaking medical circumstances, critics point out that many of these abortions are elective and occur at a point when the unborn child could potentially survive outside the womb.
The methods used in these late-term abortions are rarely discussed in public. The Atlantic described Hern’s procedures in graphic terms, explaining that sometimes “the fetus will be whole, intact,” while in other cases, it is “removed in parts.”
According to data from Ibis Reproductive Health, fewer than 20 clinics in the U.S. perform abortions after 24 weeks, and only three — in New Mexico, Maryland, and Washington, D.C. — routinely offer abortions beyond 28 weeks. This figure does not include some hospitals or specialty clinics that consider individual cases.
Nine states and Washington, D.C., currently impose no gestational limits on abortion: Alaska, Vermont, Oregon, New Mexico, Colorado, Minnesota, Michigan, Maryland, and New Jersey. Most other states set limits between 20 and 24 weeks, with certain exceptions, especially in the case of health concerns or fetal abnormalities.
The pro-life Charlotte Lozier Institute defines late-term abortion as procedures carried out at or after the point of fetal viability, typically 22 weeks, though some premature infants have survived even earlier births.
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I am a strong supporter of choice. No one has ever been able to explain to me what’s conservative about over population, and having unwanted children running unsupervised and unsupported.
68 year old WOMAN here. First, you are a guy, so you don’t understand anything about what a woman thinks.
And, if you have been paying attention, the brith rates are DOWN in the USA. DUH
Finally, woman have ALL KINDS of CHOICES and OPTIONS to avoid unwanted pregnancies. WAY more than I did in the 1070’s. Yet, I was able to CHOOSE when I did want children after 6 yaars of marriage. Oh, imagine that, having responsible sex WHILE married.
ABORTION was sold to us WOMEN in the early 1970’s as only as an emergency. NOT AS BIRTH CONTROL.
Don’t want kids in this day and age and you are too lazy to remember to take that daily pill? Well, a woman can get a 6 month spermacidal implant, an IDU, condoms and creams used together are almost 100%, don’t have sex (what a novel idea), oral and anal, mutual masterbation, and if she REALLY does not want children ever, get her tubes tied.
Children are not disposable. And, gee, I am guessing as a liberal MAN, why do you assume that unwanted children will be running unsupervised and unsupported?
You do understant what LATE TERM MEANS right? Even though you have NEVER carried a baby in YOUR WOMB EVER, right. It means that it can survive outside the womb. My niece was a late term premie. She’s almost 50 now, healthy and normal. She was wanted by her parents.
But you, a MAN, advocate a WOMAN having a perfectly normal baby being delivered (yeah, through actual labor sometimes) to be killed on the table b/c some nutcase decided at the last minute SHE didn’t want the kid after all? SERIOUSLY? And you condone a MAN, do this to a WOMAN.
I believe in gruesom – a woman willing to do that, should have to have a C-section without drugs. Let her be sliced open, the baby removed. Let her WATCH her baby die as a “doctor” murders it infront of her. Let EVERYONE witness this atrocity – the sperm donor, his parents, her parents, etc.
And then tell me that is is ok because a last minute decision was made to NOT have a BABY (sorry, at 3rd trimester, it’s a BABY, not a fetus) because, the LAW at the time allowed it. Barbaric.
You, my MAN are an ignorant fool.
VILE MAN Good riddence. At 83, he will have the rest of his short life to wrestle with his lack of morality.
And I cannot even IMAGINE a woman carrying a baby to almost birth only to murder it. God help us.