right to know when their child seeks to undergo a procedure entailing such risks. Unlike an abortion clinic counselor or another adult, who may have only a transitory role in the minor's life, it is the parents who play a permanent role and who are best able to fully attend to the child's well-being even beyond the abortion. Once the girl returns home, she may suffer physical complications from the abortion. If the parents are aware that their daughter has had an abortion, their knowledge could be critical to ensuring that the young girl receives treatment in a timely fashion with the onset of symptoms. If the parents remain ignorant of the abortion, however, they will be unable to provide the benefit of their knowledge and expertise to their young daughter in a timely manner if complications develop. This position has the support of Dr. Bruce A. Lucero, an abortionist who performed some 45,000 abortions over the course of his career. Dr. Lucero, who supported the CCPA last year, wrote an op-ed for The New York Times about his own experience with minor girls seeking abortions. "In almost all cases," Dr. Lucero wrote, "the only reason that a teen-age girl doesn't want to tell her parents about her pregnancy is that she feels ashamed and doesn't want to let her parents down."(5) However, according to Dr. Lucero, "parents are usually the ones who can best help their teen-ager consider her options. And whatever the girl's decision, parents can provide the necessary emotional support and financial assistance."(6) Moreover, Dr. Lucero explained that "patients who receive abortions at out-of-state clinics frequently do not return for follow-up care, which can lead to dangerous complications. And a teen-ager who has an abortion across state lines without her parents' knowledge is even more unlikely to tell them that she is having complications."(7)The long-term physical consequences of abortion are well known, including, as the Supreme Court ha...
