CHEYENNE - The Wyoming House of Representatives on Wednesday narrowly defeated a bill that would have required pregnant women to wait 24 hours and undergo counseling before they could get abortions.

By a vote of 32-28, the House killed on first reading the bill that supporters dubbed the "Women's Right to Know Act."

Main sponsor Bob Brechtel, R-Casper, said he brought the bill at the request of women who told him they weren't informed about the dangers of abortion before they underwent the procedure and suffered physical and psychological damage.

"What this bill really is about, is we recognize that women are injured, some percentage of women are injured emotionally and physically," Brechtel said. And he said, "periodically, someone dies."

Brechtel said the bill wasn't aimed at taking away women's right to choose to have abortions in the state.

Rather, Brechtel said the bill sought to address the question: "Do we as a body see a value in having a tool in place by which we as a body can help women make good decisions about a very important and very private issue that may come up in their lives?"

But several women representatives shot back that it was presumptuous of the sponsors of the legislation to assume that women wouldn't already discuss the issue with their doctors and families before choosing to have abortions.

Rep. Sue Wallis, R-Recluse, said she considered having an abortion 20 years ago.

"Let's just say that the situation was not good," Wallis said. "I had a marriage that was going down in flames, and I had to face just this situation that we're talking about."

Although Wallis said she decided against having an abortion, she said she did contact clinics in Wyoming and elsewhere for information about the procedure. She said all the clinics provided her with the type of medical information that the House bill would have required women to receive.

"The idea that women today going for a very safe medical procedure would not have the same informed consent that you have to go through to have a hangnail operated on is just not something - I don't have the words to articulate how that makes me feel," Wallis said.

And noting that the bill would require women to look at pictures of fetuses at different stages of development, Wallis said, "The only possible reason I can think of to force a woman to look at that at that point is intimidation."

Rep. Mary Throne, D-Cheyenne, said she agreed with the statement that the bill didn't come down to a vote on abortion itself.

"We are voting on whether the Wyoming Legislature has the right to tell doctors how to practice medicine, and in my mind, the answer to that is no," Throne said.

Throne said the obstetricians who helped bring her three babies into the world are united against the bill. And she noted that the Wyoming Medical Society, an advocacy organization for doctors in the state, had also come out against it.

Susie Pouliot, executive director of the Wyoming Medical Society, said after the vote that member doctors from around the state, including members on both sides of the abortion debate, decided last month that they opposed the bill.

"First of all, physicians are fully supportive of informed consent regardless of the procedure in question," Pouliot said. "So it was really a matter of the state Legislature stepping into the physician/patient relationship, and that was the main basis for their opposition."

Sharon Breitweiser, executive director of NARAL Pro-Choice Wyoming, said after the vote that her group was delighted.

"No, we aren't surprised, we're confident that a majority of the representatives respect the doctor-patient relationship and trust women to make decisions," Breitweiser said.

Steven Ertelt, president of Right to Life of Wyoming, issued a statement saying his group was disappointed.

"Though doctors and physicians in our state do a great job of informing patients about risks when it comes to other medical procedures, abortion is the lone procedure where many women are left in the dark," Ertelt stated. "Today's vote tells the women of Wyoming, 'The state legislature doesn't think you should know about abortion's dangers or other options.'"