To avoid the emotive nature of the term “infanticide”, the authors used the phrase “post-birth abortion”. This is clearly a highly controversial proposal, and according to the journal’s editor, Professor Julian Savulescu, director of the Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics, the authors have received death threats since the article was published. But are their ideas so outlandish and horrifying? From an objective perspective, it’s an interesting premise and one that exposes the current lunacy in the way we allow certain terminations but recoil in horror at the thought of killing a baby. I should say that I have no objection to abortion and have assisted in terminations as part of my training as a doctor.
I am aware that the mere mention of abortion polarises any debate, and I don’t intend to dip my toe in those murky waters here. However, what the article really does is expose the inconsistency in current abortion legislation and at what point we imbue the foetus – or indeed baby – with rights. This is something that any doctor who has found themselves in the neonatal intensive care unit of a hospital will be acutely aware of. In the same hospital where doctors are trying to save a premature baby born at, say, 23 weeks, a woman down the corridor is legally allowed to undergo a late-stage abortion on a foetus of the same gestation. So on the one hand we throw considerable money and resources to try to save a baby’s life, while on the other we sanction its destruction.
The current legal limit for terminating a pregnancy is 24 weeks. Most terminations occur at 13 weeks or less, with only a fraction – under 2 per cent – occurring after 20 weeks. But, even so, this still accounts for about 3,000 terminations a year. Abortions after 24 weeks are allowed if there is grave risk to the life of the woman, evidence of severe foetal abnormality or risk of grave physical and mental injury to the woman. This represents a minuscule number each year – just 0.1 per cent of all abortions. In 2010, there were 147 such abortions.
But even though these are tiny numbers, the fact is that the law is illogical. While the baby remains in utero, it can be aborted, but as soon as it passes through the birth canal and enters the world, actively terminating its life is considered murder. How does the mere process of birth suddenly mean that something has human rights and is deserving of legal protection? These late-stage abortions are, in reality, almost always because of severe abnormalities detected in the foetus. So, as the authors of the article argue, why can this not be applied to a baby?
It’s a muddle. Is it right that if a baby is born with a severe disability, the family has to accept this as their lot, with the potential impact it has on their life and their family, let alone the suffering the child itself might experience as a result of the disability? Yet if this same abnormality is detected in a foetus that is of a gestation that means it could survive outside the uterus, but it hasn’t been born, it can be terminated. Indeed, those women who choose to have a termination in these circumstances are, quite understandably, treated with sympathy and compassion for the difficult decision they have made, yet if the mother of a disabled baby asked a doctor to kill the child, the doctor would be prosecuted for murder.
There are no easy routes out of this complex moral maze. Every way I turn, I feel uncomfortable with the logical conclusion.
Coalition pushes on with NHS reform despite concerns
After my column last week, which I dedicated to analysing the NHS reform Bill, I have been inundated with emails and messages on Twitter. I want to thank all those who have taken the time to contact me and assure you that I will reply to you all. Many of you who are concerned about the Bill have asked what you can do to stop it. I’m afraid there’s no easy answer to this question and I’d welcome any suggestions from readers. Despite over 150,000 people now signing the online petition asking for the Bill to be withdrawn, the Coalition has announced that it will deny MPs the opportunity to debate the issue in Parliament. This is despite the Government’s manifesto pledge that any petition reaching more than 100,000 signatures will be eligible for a parliamentary debate.
There was a further blow to the Bill last week, however, when it emerged that even some of the Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) set up since the Bill was announced don’t think it is a good idea. Members of the City and Hackney CCG have written to the Prime Minister to ask for the Bill to be withdrawn. In their letter, they write: “We are afraid the NHS will be damaged beyond recognition in a few years if the Bill is passed.” They say that they “are now having to go through huge disruption and a very bureaucratic process to be authorised as a CCG. This is already taking us away from working on clinical pathways with our local hospital, mental health and other services.”
So much for no top-down reorganisation of the NHS. Another manifesto pledge broken.
It’s enough to drive you bats
We’ve had bird flu, swine flu and now the possibility of bat flu is looming after scientists isolated the virus in the animals for the first time. Zoonoses – the term for infections transmitted from animals to humans – are common. In a study of 1,415 pathogens known to affect humans, over 60 per cent came from animals. Before we start worrying about bats, though, it might be useful to know that most infections come from man’s best friend, the dog.
http://dalian.liao1.com/read.php?tid=249730
http://zhiai163.com/read.php?tid=110996
http://www.inshow.cc/bbs/viewthread.php?tid=357735
http://cnhis.org/read.php?tid=322001
http://pincidao.com/forum.php?mod=viewthread&tid=883561
http://www.guzhen.in/bbs/forum.php?mod=viewthread&tid=73695
http://www.51usbaby.com/upload/read.php?tid=126479