A Brain-Dead Woman Is Being Kept on Machines to Gestate a Fetus. It Was Inevitable.

Adriana Smith, a 30-year-old nurse and mother in Atlanta, has been brain-dead for over 90 days but remains on life support because she was nine weeks pregnant when declared legally dead. Her family was reportedly told by the hospital that Georgia’s abortion laws, enacted after the 2022 overturning of Roe v. Wade, prevented the removal of life support due to the presence of a fetal heartbeat. Now at approximately 22 weeks gestation, the fetus continues to develop, and Smith’s family remains in emotional turmoil. They say they were denied the ability to make a deeply personal decision, one complicated by vague and restrictive legislation that does not account for cases like this.

The article highlights how anti-abortion laws can have far-reaching effects beyond the intent of preventing elective abortions. Medical professionals, uncertain of how the law applies, may choose inaction out of fear of legal consequences. This particular case underscores the broader goals of the anti-abortion movement, particularly the push for fetal personhood, which can override the rights and autonomy of pregnant women, even after death. Smith’s case is compared to that of Marlise Muñoz in 2013, another brain-dead woman kept on life support to sustain a pregnancy, showing the legal and ethical confusion that can arise from such tragic circumstances.

For more information see Kimberly Mutcherson “A Brain-Dead Woman Is Being Kept on Machines to Gestate a Fetus. It Was Inevitable.” New York Times, May 24, 2025. 

Special thanks to Lewis Saret (Attorney, Washington, D.C.) for bringing this article to my attention.

https://lawprofessors.typepad.com/trusts_estates_prof/2025/06/a-brain-dead-woman-is-being-kept-on-machines-to-gestate-a-fetus-it-was-inevitable.html