The Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions had a hearing today about the dangers of chemical abortion drugs.
Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) asked Dr. Nisha Verma, a board-certified OB-GYN, a simple question.
Can men get pregnant?
You’d think anyone, especially a doctor, ESPECIALLY an OB-GYN, would answer no.
Yeah, not Verma. I transcribed the entire video because it will blow your mind:
HAWLEY: Do you think that men can get pregnant?VERMA: I hesitated there because I wasn’t sure where the conversation was going or what the goal was. I mean, I do take care of patients with different identities. I take care of many women. I take care of people with different identities. And so that’s where I paused. I think, yeah, I wasn’t sure where you were going with that.HAWLEY: Well, the goal is just the truth. So can men pregnant?VERMA: The reason I paused there is, I’m not really sure what the goal of the question.HAWLEY: The goal is just to establish a biological reality. You just said a moment ago that science and evidence should control, not politics. So let’s just test that proposition, can men get pregnant?VERMA: I take care of people with many identities, but…HAWLEY: Can men get pregnant?VERMA: I take care of many women that can pregnant…HAWLEY: Can men get pregnant?VERMA: I do take care of people that don’t identify as women…HAWLEY: Can men get pregnant?VERMA: As I’m saying…HAWLEY: Let me just let me just remind you, you testified a moment ago, science and evidence should control, not politics, so can men get pregnant? You’re a doctor.VERMA: I told you that science and evidence should guide medicine…HAWLEY: Do science and evidence tell us that men can get pregnant? Biological men. Can they get pregnant?VERMA: I also think yes or no questions like this are a political tool…HAWLEY: No, yes or no questions are about the truth, Doctor. Let’s not make a mockery of this proceeding. This is about science and evidence. And I’m asking you, you know, the United States Supreme Court just heard arguments yesterday at great length on this question. This is not a hypothetical question. This is not theoretical. It affects real people in their real lives, and you’re here as an expert, called by the other side as an expert, and you’ve been telling us that you, that you follow, right? You’re a doctor, and you follow the science and the evidence. So I just want to know, based on the science, can men get pregnant? That’s a yes or no question. It really is.VERMA: I think you’re trying to reduce the complexity of…HAWLEY: I’m not. I’m trying to get…it’s not complex. I’m trying to get an answer, and I’m trying to test, frankly, your veracity as a medical professional and as a scientist. Can men get pregnant?VERMA: I think you’re also conflating male and female…HAWLEY: This is extraordinary. No, I’m not conflating male and female. They’re two different things. There’s biological men and there’s biological women, and I want to know, can men get pregnant?VERMA: Well, you were talking about is biological…HAWLEY: You’re not going to answer my question. This isn’t hard, Doctor. Can men get pregnant? Yes or no?VERMA: I would be more than happy to have a conversation with you that is not coming from a place of trying to be polarized and pushing…HAWLEY: I’m not trying to be polarizing. I’m trying to ask, I think it is extraordinary that we are here and hearing about science and about women. And for the record, it’s women who get pregnant, not men. We are here about the safety of women, and science that shows that this abortion drug causes adverse health events in 11% of cases. That’s 22 times greater than the FDA label, another fact you haven’t acknowledged, and yet you won’t even acknowledge the basic reality that biological men don’t get pregnant.There’s a difference between biological men and biological women. I just, I don’t know how we can take you seriously and your claims to be a person of science, if you won’t level with this on this basic issue. I thought we were past all of this, frankly, I can’t believe we’re still here talking about this.VERMA: I am a person of science, and I’m also someone here who’s here to represent the complex experiences of my patients, and I don’t think polarized languages, language or questions, serve that goal. I don’t think they serve the American..HAWLEY: It is not polarizing to say that there is a scientific difference between men and women, and I want this to be clear, and for the record, it is not polarizing to say that women are a biological reality and should be treated and protected as such. That is not polarizing. That is truth. It is also, by the way, the United States Constitution, which offers unique protections to women in a variety of circumstances as women. And your refusal to recognize women as women and men as men, is deeply corrosive to science, to public trust and yes to constitutional protections for women as women.And I just, I think it’s extraordinary that you would sit here and advance a political agenda that has been thoroughly discredited and rejected by the American people in this forum, and I’m glad we had this exchange, because it is exceptionally clarifying. It is also, in many ways, quite depressing.
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