The Maryland law, for example, grants the right to induce abortion whenever two or more physicians see the patient and agree that "no other method will secure the safety of the mother." Similar rules are prescribed by the statutes of other States, but none concedes the right of abortion as a means of keeping the woman from suicide. Since therapeutic abortions are legal, they may be done openly; hence the operation is performed in appropriate surroundings and with every refinement of surgical technique. These fortunate conditions materially alter the outlook; serious consequences of the operation itself need not be feared. Competent surgeons, employing modern methods, may perform hundreds of abortions without the loss of a single patient. Moreover, pregnancy may be terminated safely and expeditiously at any time; the lay view which regards abortion as more serious after the second month than before it is a relic of days gone by. PREMATURE DELIVERY.--In the introduction to this chapter we noted that the infant becomes viable after the twenty-eighth week, which marks in a practical sense, the transition of the fetus from an immature to a premature stage of development. In point of frequency, premature delivery ranks far below either abortion or miscarriage. Unlawful interference with pregnancy generally proceeds from a desire to avoid offspring, and lacks incentive after the infant becomes capable of living independently. Criminal operations, therefore, are not a conspicuous cause of premature delivery. Occasionally physicians resort to artificial means to end gestation during the later months in order that organic complications may be relieved; but most premature births occur spontaneously. Sometimes they are due to ill-health, while in other instances no evidence of disease is found in either mother or child. Careful study of the individual patient, however, is generally helpful toward the prevention of repeated premature delivery. The course of premature labor closely resembles delivery at full term. But it is shorter because the infant is small; and the subsequent loss of blood is not so great. The recovery of the mother is never retarded by the fact of earlier delivery, though the conditions which caused it may prevent rapid convalescence.