Salt Lake City ? A woman accused of murder because she allegedly refused a Caesarean section that could have saved her unborn twin denied the charge Friday, rejecting claims she avoided the surgery because she feared scarring.

“It was all medical concern. None of it was vanity,” Melissa Ann Rowland said a day after prosecutors charged her with exhibiting “depraved indifference to human life” in avoiding the C-section. One nurse told police Rowland said she would rather “lose one of the babies than be cut like that.”

Rowland said her other two children, ages 7 and 9, both were delivered by C-section.

“I never imagined having a stillborn would get me national news coverage or a murder charge,” Rowland said during a jail interview.

Her attorney said Rowland had a history of mental illness. Rowland said she had attempted suicide twice and spent time in a psychiatric hospital.

Rowland, 28, has been jailed since mid-January on a child endangerment charge involving the surviving twin.

“I feel like I’m getting a lot of attention that (should be) my private business,” she said.

Critics of the charges say the case could affect abortion rights and open the door to the prosecution of mothers who smoke, fail to follow their obstetrician’s diet advice or take some other action that endangers a fetus.

“I see this as part of an overall focus of a certain movement on fetal rights and an effort to elevate fetal rights above the rights of a woman,” said Kim Gandy, president of the National Organization for Women and a former prosecutor.

Rowland, from the Salt Lake City suburb of West Jordan, was warned numerous times between Christmas and Jan. 9 that her unborn twins were likely to die if she did not get immediate medical treatment, charging documents allege. When she delivered them Jan. 13, a baby girl survived but her twin, a boy, was stillborn.

The baby has been adopted by a family Rowland knows. Her other children live with her estranged husband’s parents.