A first-of-its-kind bill in Wisconsin would protect women from miscarriage criminalization. Meanwhile, Gov. Tony Evers pledges to veto Republicans’ sweeping fetal personhood law that treats women like incubators, not people.
This piece was adapted from two pieces originally published by UpNorthNews: “Kelda Roys is on a mission to stop a Republican bill that could criminalize miscarriage“ and “Doctors say Wisconsin GOP’s pregnancy bill treats women like ‘incubators,’ not people.“
As pregnancy loss is increasingly criminalized across the country, Wisconsin state Sen. Kelda Roys is determined that no woman in her state who suffers a miscarriage or stillbirth will ever endure the added trauma of being treated like a criminal—or forced into dangerous medical care by politicians.
Roys recently introduced the Pregnancy Loss Protection Act, the first bill of its kind in Wisconsin. Its goal is to prevent overzealous prosecutors or law enforcement officers from targeting people who experience miscarriage or stillbirth, while also pushing back against a broader Republican effort to confer legal personhood on embryos from the moment of fertilization.
“The anti-choice movement, I’ve always believed, is really motivated not by concern for fetal life or the well-being of children and women, but by a deep contempt for women,” Roys said.
Why Miscarriage Has Become a Crime Risk
In the first year after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, more than 200 women—mostly low-income, many of whom had miscarried—were charged with crimes such as “abuse of a corpse,” “concealment of a death” and “abandonment of a corpse.” Other women faced charges like child neglect, child endangerment and homicide by child abuse.
Winning these cases would allow prosecutors to argue that a fetus—even in the earliest stages of pregnancy—is a legal person, opening the door to treating miscarriage, stillbirth and abortion as homicide. The premise behind these prosecutions is that something a woman did during pregnancy must have caused the loss.
There is no medical or scientific basis for this logic. Natural miscarriages occur in roughly 20 percent of pregnancies, with some estimates as high as 30 percent.
“When you have the view that abortion is a crime or should be a crime, then naturally you’re going to suspect that someone who has had a miscarriage has taken abortion medication or done something to cause it,” Roys told UpNorthNews.
“This is an incredibly traumatic, physically and psychologically painful event,” she said. “But then to be treated like a criminal and have your body treated as a crime scene on top of that, is just horrific.”
The Case That Haunts Lawmakers and Doctors Alike
The nightmare Roys is trying to prevent is exemplified by the case of Brittany Watts.
In 2023, Watts, then 34, rushed to a hospital in Youngstown, Ohio, during the 21st week of a wanted pregnancy after she began bleeding heavily. Doctors diagnosed a placental abruption and later PPROM—a dangerous rupture of membranes accompanied by infection. Despite being told her pregnancy was doomed and that she faced risks of hemorrhage, sepsis and death, Watts waited hours at the hospital without receiving treatment.
She ultimately miscarried at home in agony. When she returned to the hospital seeking care for her infection, a nurse called police and falsely reported that Watts may have delivered a live baby and disposed of it.
Police raided her home, interrogated her while she was hospitalized, and charged her with “abuse of a corpse,” exposing her to a possible year in prison. An autopsy later confirmed the fetus had died in utero, and a grand jury declined to indict her. Watts is now suing the hospital and law enforcement agencies involved.
“As someone who has experienced a miscarriage myself and given birth to three children, I find it totally unacceptable that our society is targeting pregnant women at the worst moment of their lives,” Roys said.
Wisconsin Republicans Push Further
Although Wisconsin women are no longer subject to the state’s 1849 abortion ban following a 2023 court ruling, Roys says legal threats remain acute.
In late 2025, Wisconsin Senate Republicans passed SB 553, a bill that defines embryos, fertilized eggs and fetuses as “unborn children” and “human beings” from the moment of fertilization. The bill passed with the support of every Republican senator and opposition from all Democrats.
While Gov. Tony Evers has said he will veto the bill if it reaches his desk, Roys says its passage reveals Republican lawmakers’ intent.
“None of us are really safe,” she said.
Doctors Warn Women’s Lives Are at Risk
Wisconsin OB-GYNs say SB 553 goes even further than criminalization: It actively endangers pregnant women by instructing doctors to use dangerous procedures instead of standard medical care.
Dr. Kristin Lyerly, a Wisconsin-based OB-GYN, says the bill urges physicians to terminate nonviable pregnancies through cesarean sections or labor inductions in an attempt to preserve the life of an “unborn child.”
“That tells you exactly how they think of women,” Lyerly said. “As incubators, not human beings.”
The bill discourages doctors from using standard, safe procedures like D&C (dilation and curettage) or D&E (dilation and evacuation), instead pushing aggressive surgeries that carry higher risks of bleeding, infection, loss of fertility and death.
Three Wisconsin OB-GYNs interviewed by UpNorthNews agreed that the bill threatens women’s health, fertility and lives.
“It is counseling women to have a more dangerous and invasive procedure,” Roys said. “It’s a continuation of the effort to police women’s behavior and police women’s bodies.”
Redefining Abortion: “Orwellian”
SB 553 also attempts to redefine the word “abortion,” asserting that a termination performed to prevent the death of a pregnant woman is not an abortion if it is not “designed or intended to kill the unborn child.”
Roys calls the effort “Orwellian.”
“The antiabortion movement has been trying to manipulate vocabulary for years to argue that abortion is never necessary to save a pregnant person’s life,” she said.
Doctors say this deliberate confusion puts them in impossible positions and delays care in emergencies.
“This legislation talks about preventing death,” Lyerly said, “but it does not talk about preserving the health of my patients. That’s my job.”
Personhood and IVF at Risk
Doctors also warn that SB 553 quietly functions as a personhood law by stating that an egg is a human being from the moment of fertilization.
By granting fertilized eggs status as human beings, the bill is giving those eggs legal rights which are equal to those of their pregnant mothers.
“What about all of those fertilized eggs that never implant? They just pass out of somebody’s body and are never detected,” said Dr. Lyerly. “Fertilized eggs that become a very early miscarriage and pass out of a woman when she just has a heavy period.”
Therefore the bill creates unavoidable conflicts of interests between pregnant women and their own fertilized eggs.
Dr. Anna Igler, who conceived two of her children through IVF, says the law would have made her family impossible.
That’s because when embryos are created through IVF, they are tested for genetic abnormalities. Currently, those that are incompatible with life, are discarded. But a potential law like SB553, which confers legal personhood on those abnormal embryos creates huge issues for potential parents, Dr. Igler points out.
“If this bill is signed into law, what would we do with embryos that are genetically abnormal?” she asked. “This bill was not thought out.”
A similar personhood ruling in Alabama in 2024 forced IVF clinics to shut down until lawmakers granted them immunity.
Many antiabortion groups vehemently oppose IVF procedures because they create embryos that are never implanted inside a woman’s womb.
Fighting Back
Roys says she will continue pushing the Pregnancy Loss Protection Act in 2026 to protect Wisconsin women from prosecution and medical coercion.
“You should be able to trust that legislators have your best interest in mind and that they care about your health,” Dr. Lyerly said. “Unfortunately, with SB 553, that isn’t the case.”
Gov. Evers is expected to veto SB 553, but he is not seeking re-election. The leading Republican candidates for governor have taken strong antiabortion positions and are unlikely to block similar legislation.
Until then, Roys says, the fight is far from over.
