I do post stuff from the Calgary Herald as it is one of the papers I read on a daily basis. It is a point of view and in my opinion accords with what our faith tells us about this issue. This issue will always remain subjective depending on what point of view one looks at it. There are no universally accepted scientific and factual values on this issue. We leave in a free society and one is free to laugh at whatever feels funny so long as one is not deluded in the process.....Mehreen1221 wrote:KMaherali, Why do you paste stuff only from caglary hairold?...To me, honestly, it mostly sounds judgmental and subjective commentary on people's personal belief and morality, instead of with universally accepted scientific and factual values...most Europeans usually either laugh at that kinda stuff or get upset if they take it seriously...
Abortion in Ismaili Religion
Why would there be a scientifically accepted view on abortion. The issue is entirely politically and morally based. Medically, abortions have been necessary to save the life of the mother, but that's neither here nor there for this debate. You mentioned that one lives in a free society and yet you're backing an article that makes doctor's subjective to their own views. I'm assuming you're anti-abortion, so how would you feel if you or a loved one had a doctor who pushed for an abortion when keeping or removing the fetus provides no real difference. My guess would be that you would want the choice to be yours and not up to someone else. And that is essentially the viewpoint of pro-choice, it's not about being pro-abortions, but that every woman should be allowed to make a decision based on her situation and personal viewpoints rather than someone else making the decision for her.
I think the article is not about the doctors being subjective to their views but rather about them being able to practice according to their conscience and moral convictions.a1337 wrote:You mentioned that one lives in a free society and yet you're backing an article that makes doctor's subjective to their own views.
I think in exercising choice according to the freedom, we should also be provided with all the information necessary for our long term health and wellbeing. The article points to some of the harmful long term effects of abortion which individuals would perhaps be not aware of in making their choices.
Doctor's are service providers not decision makers! Doctors can and must not be permitted to impose there moral idiosyncrasies upon their patients, however, they should free feel to discuss important issues with their patients so that they can have a complete and full understanding of any issue they may be facing regarding their health and well being. As such this is a very progressive and good policy (quite a surprise coming from Alberta). This editorial is clearly bias and that's okay. But any rational person cannot reasonably be upset at a policy that requires doctor's not to withhold information from their patients.
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Mehreen1221
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Well, out of Freedom Of Choice [of morals as well)…Though each case can be different from others, whether abortion of a pregnancy and at what stage should be done or not depends entirely on individual cases and their medical, psychological and social effects and other details, but all this should not override the choice of the mother who is bearing the pregnancy… and this is the law pretty much everywhere after decades of struggle and debates...
Speaking of decision making for others...it's no wonder why that self proclaimed decider/stupider of the fate of the American people and the rest of the world to an extent, first chose caglary to visit and bullshitting after out of the office...atleast, he doesn't have to worry about flying shoes and ducking them.
Speaking of decision making for others...it's no wonder why that self proclaimed decider/stupider of the fate of the American people and the rest of the world to an extent, first chose caglary to visit and bullshitting after out of the office...atleast, he doesn't have to worry about flying shoes and ducking them.
Straight talk about life -- evasions about death
By Naomi Lakritz, Calgary HeraldMay 20, 2009 9:08 AM
The past week has been a time of, literally, discussions about life and death. U. S. President Barack Obama talked about abortion when he gave the commencement speech at Indiana's Notre Dame University. And Bloc Quebecois MP Francine Lalonde reintroduced for the third time her private member's bill decriminalizing euthanasia, which my fellow columnist Licia Corbella wrote about at length on Saturday. The parallels between abortion and euthanasia are striking. They're both about when--and where along the continuum--it should be legal to take someone else's life. The short, simple answer before someone trots out all the "yeah, buts" is--never.
Obama, who intends to sign the Freedom of Choice Act, which permits partial-birth abortions, called on pro-life and pro-choice factions to find common ground.
Unless pro-choicers are prepared to acknowledge the scientific fact that a fetus as early as four weeks after conception is a human being with a beating heart and brain waves, and not a mere clump of cells whose humanness is relative only to its degree of wantedness, then no common ground is possible.
Obama made some redundant points when he said "let's make adoption more available" and "let's provide care and support for women who do carry their child to term."
Adoption is already widely available through state and provincial governments and private agencies. What really needs to happen is for pro-choicers to stop limiting their talk to abortion when they discuss choice, and start promoting adoption. They need to talk in terms of women choosing life, as in putting their babies up for adoption, not in choosing death by condemning those unborn babies to being ripped apart and consigned to oblivion.
As far as providing care and support for women to see their pregnancies through to the end, there are plenty of pro-life agencies, both secular and faith-based, which are busy doing just that.
There's no need to reinvent the wheel; there is only a need to promote the existence of the wheel so people can take advantage of it.
Obama also made two nonsensical points. The first was when he said "let's reduce unintended pregnancies."
Unless "we" are in the room at the propitious moment, handing out contraceptives to an amorous man and an ovulating woman, that is probably not a realistic goal.
The second point was when he urged abortion providers to get women to consider other options. Not likely, Mr. President. Each one of those babies consigned to the aforementioned oblivion means money in the pockets of the abortion providers. When death equals profit, those who make their living from it are not going to sabotage their earning potential by taking the moral high road.
The pro-life slogan has always been "choose life."
How interesting that the opposing faction never says "choose death" although that is exactly what opting for both abortion and euthanasia entail. Their approach is not so straightforward; they prefer to couch their ideology in euphemism. Lalonde, for example, refers to assisted suicide as the "ultimate compassion."
But compassion for whom? For the health-care system which saves money by moving elderly patients out of their beds and into their graves more quickly? For the patient's relatives who really ought to be spared all the messy, depressing, nasty realities of what death is like when it is allowed to take its natural course?
In her lucid moments during her last year of life, my mother would ask: "When can I go home? I want to get out of here." My brother did not tell her that she would have to go to a nursing home if she left the hospital, because she couldn't live alone anymore. Instead, he would promise her,"When you're well enough." She had dementia and she suffered a lot of pain, but she still wanted to live; she still had hope. She still had her sights set on getting well.
Yet, she would have fit to a T the description of the type of person Lalonde has in mind as a candidate for the "ultimate compassion," someone who "continues . . . to experience severe physical . . . pain without any prospect of relief." Who dares to presume that within a patient who does not seem lucid, who is in pain, or who can't speak, there is no spark of life that burns stubbornly and does not want to be extinguished?
Although Lalonde's bill comes with requirements for the patient to furnish written requests to die, 10 days apart, or to designate someone else to make such a decision on his or her behalf, as Corbella notes, the Netherlands' nightmarish experimenting with euthanasia has led to doctors killing patients who never gave their consent.
Life is a continuum and there is no demarcation zone on it where life is more hazily defined or has lesser value. I think if one must err, somewhere, at any place on the continuum, then it must always be on the side of life. Always.
nlakritz@theherald. Canwest.Com
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
By Naomi Lakritz, Calgary HeraldMay 20, 2009 9:08 AM
The past week has been a time of, literally, discussions about life and death. U. S. President Barack Obama talked about abortion when he gave the commencement speech at Indiana's Notre Dame University. And Bloc Quebecois MP Francine Lalonde reintroduced for the third time her private member's bill decriminalizing euthanasia, which my fellow columnist Licia Corbella wrote about at length on Saturday. The parallels between abortion and euthanasia are striking. They're both about when--and where along the continuum--it should be legal to take someone else's life. The short, simple answer before someone trots out all the "yeah, buts" is--never.
Obama, who intends to sign the Freedom of Choice Act, which permits partial-birth abortions, called on pro-life and pro-choice factions to find common ground.
Unless pro-choicers are prepared to acknowledge the scientific fact that a fetus as early as four weeks after conception is a human being with a beating heart and brain waves, and not a mere clump of cells whose humanness is relative only to its degree of wantedness, then no common ground is possible.
Obama made some redundant points when he said "let's make adoption more available" and "let's provide care and support for women who do carry their child to term."
Adoption is already widely available through state and provincial governments and private agencies. What really needs to happen is for pro-choicers to stop limiting their talk to abortion when they discuss choice, and start promoting adoption. They need to talk in terms of women choosing life, as in putting their babies up for adoption, not in choosing death by condemning those unborn babies to being ripped apart and consigned to oblivion.
As far as providing care and support for women to see their pregnancies through to the end, there are plenty of pro-life agencies, both secular and faith-based, which are busy doing just that.
There's no need to reinvent the wheel; there is only a need to promote the existence of the wheel so people can take advantage of it.
Obama also made two nonsensical points. The first was when he said "let's reduce unintended pregnancies."
Unless "we" are in the room at the propitious moment, handing out contraceptives to an amorous man and an ovulating woman, that is probably not a realistic goal.
The second point was when he urged abortion providers to get women to consider other options. Not likely, Mr. President. Each one of those babies consigned to the aforementioned oblivion means money in the pockets of the abortion providers. When death equals profit, those who make their living from it are not going to sabotage their earning potential by taking the moral high road.
The pro-life slogan has always been "choose life."
How interesting that the opposing faction never says "choose death" although that is exactly what opting for both abortion and euthanasia entail. Their approach is not so straightforward; they prefer to couch their ideology in euphemism. Lalonde, for example, refers to assisted suicide as the "ultimate compassion."
But compassion for whom? For the health-care system which saves money by moving elderly patients out of their beds and into their graves more quickly? For the patient's relatives who really ought to be spared all the messy, depressing, nasty realities of what death is like when it is allowed to take its natural course?
In her lucid moments during her last year of life, my mother would ask: "When can I go home? I want to get out of here." My brother did not tell her that she would have to go to a nursing home if she left the hospital, because she couldn't live alone anymore. Instead, he would promise her,"When you're well enough." She had dementia and she suffered a lot of pain, but she still wanted to live; she still had hope. She still had her sights set on getting well.
Yet, she would have fit to a T the description of the type of person Lalonde has in mind as a candidate for the "ultimate compassion," someone who "continues . . . to experience severe physical . . . pain without any prospect of relief." Who dares to presume that within a patient who does not seem lucid, who is in pain, or who can't speak, there is no spark of life that burns stubbornly and does not want to be extinguished?
Although Lalonde's bill comes with requirements for the patient to furnish written requests to die, 10 days apart, or to designate someone else to make such a decision on his or her behalf, as Corbella notes, the Netherlands' nightmarish experimenting with euthanasia has led to doctors killing patients who never gave their consent.
Life is a continuum and there is no demarcation zone on it where life is more hazily defined or has lesser value. I think if one must err, somewhere, at any place on the continuum, then it must always be on the side of life. Always.
nlakritz@theherald. Canwest.Com
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
quran to the rescue !!!!!
"Say: Come, I will rehearse what God has really prohibited you from: Join nothing as equal with Him; be good to your parents, kill not your children on a plea of poverty; We provide sustenance for you and for them; approach not shameful deeds, whether open or secret; take not life, which God has made sacred, except by a way of justice and law (Chapter 6, Verse 151).
In another verse, the Holy Quran says: "Kill not your children for fear of want; it is We who provide sustenance for them as well as for you; for verily killing them is a great sin.
(Chapter 17, Verse 31).
It threatens the murderer with retaliation in this life
"O ye who believe! The law of equality is prescribed to you in cases of murder…", 2.178)
and the punishment of Hell in the life to come for the one who premeditatedly murders a fellow Muslim:
"If a man kills a believer intentionally, his recompense is Hell, to abide therein (for ever)" [4.93].
"Say: Come, I will rehearse what God has really prohibited you from: Join nothing as equal with Him; be good to your parents, kill not your children on a plea of poverty; We provide sustenance for you and for them; approach not shameful deeds, whether open or secret; take not life, which God has made sacred, except by a way of justice and law (Chapter 6, Verse 151).
In another verse, the Holy Quran says: "Kill not your children for fear of want; it is We who provide sustenance for them as well as for you; for verily killing them is a great sin.
(Chapter 17, Verse 31).
It threatens the murderer with retaliation in this life
"O ye who believe! The law of equality is prescribed to you in cases of murder…", 2.178)
and the punishment of Hell in the life to come for the one who premeditatedly murders a fellow Muslim:
"If a man kills a believer intentionally, his recompense is Hell, to abide therein (for ever)" [4.93].
Silence on abortion's link to breast cancer suspect
By Susan Martinuk, Calgary HeraldJanuary 29, 2010
For the past 15 years, there's been a growing controversy over the link between induced abortion and increased risk of breast cancer. But few Canadian women would know the details that may be germane to dramatically reducing their risk of breast cancer. And fewer still would know that a key researcher at the National Cancer Institute has now reversed her position and stated that abortion is a significant factor in raising the risk of breast cancer.
Women should know that one of the most respected researchers in the field, Dr. Louise Brinton (chief of the institute's Division of Cancer Epidemiology and Genetics) co-authored a 2009 study stating that induced abortion increased the risk of triple-negative breast cancer by 40 per cent in women under 45. The paper, published in Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers and Prevention, stated the above and then further observed that this increase was "consistent with the effects observed in previous studies on younger women."
The debate about this link has been ongoing since 1996 when Dr. Joel Brind published a meta-analysis of 21 studies on the topic in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health. The pooled data showed that women who had abortions had a 30 per cent increase in developing breast cancer.
His work was immediately written off in the media as biased or substandard. Few bothered to report that one of the co-authors was staunchly pro-abortion or that a respected pro-abortion epidemiologist said the study was "very objective and beyond reproach."
Over 29 credible studies supporting the link have since been reported. A 2007 study in the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons reported that induced abortion was the risk factor that best predicted the incidence of breast cancer in women in eight European countries.
In the midst of this growing body of knowledge, Dr. Brinton organized a 2003 workshop to discuss the studies. It subsequently issued a statement to American women saying, "abortion is not associated with increased breast cancer risk."
Six years later, Dr. Brinton herself has published a study that directly counters that statement and lends its support to previous studies that demonstrate the link between breast cancer and abortion.
Of course, this time there are no accusations of bias or sloppy work. In fact, for the most part, there has simply been silence. There have been no statements from women's groups and no calls for further studies to confirm or deny the claims. Even the National Cancer Institute has refused to comment on the dramatic reversal.
The topic of breast cancer has long been a media darling and, consequently, there's been no shortage of reports on the plethora of new medical discoveries that are constantly shifting the rules for preventing, diagnosing and treating this disease. We're told about coffee, chocolate and wine; and the usefulness (or not) of mammograms and the harms (or not) of hormone replacement therapy. But this urgent need to keep women informed and up-to-date on the latest research suddenly dissipates if it means turning a critical eye to the sacred cow of abortion.
In what is surely a Ripley's Believe it or Not moment, the Globe and Mail was the one Canadian newspaper to report the abrupt reversal and its political impact in Canada. Conservative MP Maurice Vellacott, widely known for his pro-life views, had previously mentioned the link and now felt vindicated by current events. But the Liberals' Status of Women critic Anita Neville was quick to call on Prime Minister Stephen Harper to silence Vellacott for his supposedly "false and misleading" statements. In a media release, Neville claimed Vellacott had denigrated "women and their rights and freedoms, adding "enough is enough . . . women deserve better from their elected representatives."
I agree with Neville. Women do deserve better. They deserve better from the leaders of women's groups and cancer groups. They deserve to have leaders who push for more information and research. They deserve better from politicians who try to push uncomfortable health facts under the dirty carpet. Most of all, they deserve to receive important health facts without political and ideological filters.
Susan Martinuk's column runs every Friday.
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
By Susan Martinuk, Calgary HeraldJanuary 29, 2010
For the past 15 years, there's been a growing controversy over the link between induced abortion and increased risk of breast cancer. But few Canadian women would know the details that may be germane to dramatically reducing their risk of breast cancer. And fewer still would know that a key researcher at the National Cancer Institute has now reversed her position and stated that abortion is a significant factor in raising the risk of breast cancer.
Women should know that one of the most respected researchers in the field, Dr. Louise Brinton (chief of the institute's Division of Cancer Epidemiology and Genetics) co-authored a 2009 study stating that induced abortion increased the risk of triple-negative breast cancer by 40 per cent in women under 45. The paper, published in Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers and Prevention, stated the above and then further observed that this increase was "consistent with the effects observed in previous studies on younger women."
The debate about this link has been ongoing since 1996 when Dr. Joel Brind published a meta-analysis of 21 studies on the topic in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health. The pooled data showed that women who had abortions had a 30 per cent increase in developing breast cancer.
His work was immediately written off in the media as biased or substandard. Few bothered to report that one of the co-authors was staunchly pro-abortion or that a respected pro-abortion epidemiologist said the study was "very objective and beyond reproach."
Over 29 credible studies supporting the link have since been reported. A 2007 study in the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons reported that induced abortion was the risk factor that best predicted the incidence of breast cancer in women in eight European countries.
In the midst of this growing body of knowledge, Dr. Brinton organized a 2003 workshop to discuss the studies. It subsequently issued a statement to American women saying, "abortion is not associated with increased breast cancer risk."
Six years later, Dr. Brinton herself has published a study that directly counters that statement and lends its support to previous studies that demonstrate the link between breast cancer and abortion.
Of course, this time there are no accusations of bias or sloppy work. In fact, for the most part, there has simply been silence. There have been no statements from women's groups and no calls for further studies to confirm or deny the claims. Even the National Cancer Institute has refused to comment on the dramatic reversal.
The topic of breast cancer has long been a media darling and, consequently, there's been no shortage of reports on the plethora of new medical discoveries that are constantly shifting the rules for preventing, diagnosing and treating this disease. We're told about coffee, chocolate and wine; and the usefulness (or not) of mammograms and the harms (or not) of hormone replacement therapy. But this urgent need to keep women informed and up-to-date on the latest research suddenly dissipates if it means turning a critical eye to the sacred cow of abortion.
In what is surely a Ripley's Believe it or Not moment, the Globe and Mail was the one Canadian newspaper to report the abrupt reversal and its political impact in Canada. Conservative MP Maurice Vellacott, widely known for his pro-life views, had previously mentioned the link and now felt vindicated by current events. But the Liberals' Status of Women critic Anita Neville was quick to call on Prime Minister Stephen Harper to silence Vellacott for his supposedly "false and misleading" statements. In a media release, Neville claimed Vellacott had denigrated "women and their rights and freedoms, adding "enough is enough . . . women deserve better from their elected representatives."
I agree with Neville. Women do deserve better. They deserve better from the leaders of women's groups and cancer groups. They deserve to have leaders who push for more information and research. They deserve better from politicians who try to push uncomfortable health facts under the dirty carpet. Most of all, they deserve to receive important health facts without political and ideological filters.
Susan Martinuk's column runs every Friday.
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
India’s Inverted Abortion Politics
IN America, many state governments have tried to curb abortion by placing severe restrictions on providers and clinics, purportedly for women’s protection, despite opposition from the American Medical Association and other groups. If the limits are allowed to stand, self-induced abortions are expected to rise, leading to an escalation of health dangers to women, particularly those who can’t afford to travel for help.
In India, a curious inversion of this story is playing out: The government is trying to reduce the qualifications required of providers so that poor women will have easier access to abortions, while doctors are the ones opposing this relaxation of rules.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/03/opini ... 05309&_r=0
IN America, many state governments have tried to curb abortion by placing severe restrictions on providers and clinics, purportedly for women’s protection, despite opposition from the American Medical Association and other groups. If the limits are allowed to stand, self-induced abortions are expected to rise, leading to an escalation of health dangers to women, particularly those who can’t afford to travel for help.
In India, a curious inversion of this story is playing out: The government is trying to reduce the qualifications required of providers so that poor women will have easier access to abortions, while doctors are the ones opposing this relaxation of rules.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/03/opini ... 05309&_r=0
Pope Francis Eases Path to Absolution for Abortion
ROME — Pope Francis announced Tuesday that all Roman Catholic priests would be empowered to offer absolution for the “sin of abortion” during the church’s Holy Year of Mercy, which begins in December.
“I have met so many women who bear in their heart the scar of this agonizing and painful decision,” Francis said in a statement issued by the Vatican. “What has happened is profoundly unjust; yet only understanding the truth of it can enable one not to lose hope.”
More...
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/02/world ... d=45305309
******
Response from anti-abortionist...
The Pope’s Unforgiving Message of Forgiveness on Abortion
"Despite the concern for what the pope calls an “agonizing and painful decision,” research shows that a vast majority of women who terminate pregnancies in the United States don’t actually feel bad about it. In surveys, nearly all say it was the right thing to do, and positive feelings of relief or happiness outweigh negative feelings of regret or guilt for more than nine in 10 women, even years after the procedure."
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/11/opini ... ef=opinion
ROME — Pope Francis announced Tuesday that all Roman Catholic priests would be empowered to offer absolution for the “sin of abortion” during the church’s Holy Year of Mercy, which begins in December.
“I have met so many women who bear in their heart the scar of this agonizing and painful decision,” Francis said in a statement issued by the Vatican. “What has happened is profoundly unjust; yet only understanding the truth of it can enable one not to lose hope.”
More...
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/02/world ... d=45305309
******
Response from anti-abortionist...
The Pope’s Unforgiving Message of Forgiveness on Abortion
"Despite the concern for what the pope calls an “agonizing and painful decision,” research shows that a vast majority of women who terminate pregnancies in the United States don’t actually feel bad about it. In surveys, nearly all say it was the right thing to do, and positive feelings of relief or happiness outweigh negative feelings of regret or guilt for more than nine in 10 women, even years after the procedure."
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/11/opini ... ef=opinion
Last edited by kmaherali on Fri Sep 11, 2015 6:08 am, edited 1 time in total.
Does Down Syndrome Justify Abortion?
Villanova, Pa. — IT was the most heart-wrenching moment of our lives, and all I could do was stare at the tissue box.
A week earlier, my pregnant wife, Jennifer, had undergone a routine prenatal ultrasound that revealed “soft markers” suggestive of genetic abnormalities. Now we were in the consultation room awaiting the results of the amniocentesis, which would conclusively determine whether our daughter would be born with Down syndrome.
Of course they don’t put you in the room with the industrial-strength Kleenex just to tell you everything’s going to be fine. After the doctors gave us the news, they casually told us how an in utero diagnosis of Down syndrome meant perhaps a 50-50 chance of miscarriage or stillbirth.
If our daughter somehow made it to full term, her expected life span would be far shorter than a typical child’s, and she’d most likely have a whole host of medical issues requiring a lifetime of medical care. Then consider the cognitive impairments, special education programs and social ostracism. It was a lot to take in.
Hammering home the momentous difficulties that would await us as parents was clearly a tactical move by the doctor to push us toward an abortion.
That abortion is not the exception, but rather the expectation in cases of Down syndrome, is not limited to medical professionals. Though precise numbers are unavailable, at least two-thirds and as many as 90 percent of fetuses found to have Down syndrome in utero are aborted. Public opinion polls show that Americans are significantly less critical of abortion in the case of mental or physical impairment. Even the Dalai Lama says it is understandable.
So it raised eyebrows when we — a couple of pro-choice liberals — informed our doctors that we had chosen not to terminate the pregnancy. There was pushback: Did we not understand the decision?
We were sure that we’d love and care for our child regardless of her abilities. Today, despite complications and frustrations beyond those of raising a typical child, Sophia is an exuberant 8-year-old, soaking up the last rays of summer fun before entering third grade.
We have never had second thoughts, even though we understand why some parents might choose otherwise. Which is why it was particularly distressing to learn that this fall Ohio is likely to become the second state (after North Dakota) to outlaw abortion after an in utero diagnosis of Down syndrome.
The Ohio bill may be just the latest maneuver by pro-life conservatives in their war to curtail a woman’s right to choose. But as my wife and I learned, when it comes to abortion and special needs, there is no easy answer — and the idea that these deeply personal ethical and social decisions could simply be legislated away is ridiculous.
Both conservative lawmakers and their liberal opponents have surprisingly little understanding of the special-needs theater of engagement they’ve stumbled into.
For one thing, conventional pro-life versus pro-choice debates quickly become tinged with overtones about “slippery-slope” genocide, predicting the eventual disappearance of people with Down syndrome as a group. Such claims are often hysterical, but they’re not ungrounded: As our ability to screen for “undesirable” genetic traits expands, so does the potential for abortion based upon those characteristics.
Importantly, the conventional social dynamics around abortion are completely reversed. Among the families of people with disabilities, you’ll find ardent pro-choice advocates (like my wife and me) who choose not to abort. And with a vast majority of diagnoses ending in abortion, you’re likely to find many strident pro-life conservatives opting for abortion in the face of such challenges.
This doesn’t mean these people are hypocrites. Rather, it shows how tricky the issue is. In a typical pregnancy, women who choose to have an abortion are often saddled with shame and social stigma, even from friends, relatives and the broader public. Meanwhile, despite recent strides, there remains significant stigma associated with being the parent of a child with special needs.
In the end, my wife and I chose to have Sophia. We had to fight for her in the face of widespread medical and societal pressures to terminate. And that was our choice.
The Ohio bill would do away with that choice, forcing everyone placed in that unenviable situation to carry to term a child with developmental disabilities, regardless of their willingness and ability to love and care for that child once it is born.
At the same time, Republicans are pushing to slash assistance programs like Medicaid at the federal level and gutting home-based care and other services in Ohio that offset at least some of the tremendous medical and financial burdens placed on families of children with disabilities. Even if it somehow cleared the insurmountable constitutional hurdles, the foreseeable long-term impact of this legislation would be increased stresses on the family, bankruptcies and an influx of children with disabilities into orphanages and foster care.
Perhaps if Ohio’s Republican legislators grappled with such difficult decisions and their consequences, they might understand the futility and hypocrisy of imposing their abstract beliefs where they don’t conform to reality.
Mark Lawrence Schrad is an assistant professor of political science at Villanova University.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/04/opini ... d=71987722
*****
To the Editor:
Re “Special Needs, Hard Decisions,” by Mark Lawrence Schrad (Op-Ed, Sept. 4):
I laud Mr. Schrad for his willingness to share his and his wife’s experience of continuing a pregnancy involving a baby with Down syndrome. But as a physician specializing in women’s health, I disagree with the premise of the article.
Abortion need not be justified to anyone at any time, nor does a decision to continue a pregnancy require justification. Women and couples know what is right for them, just as Mr. Schrad’s experience shows.
SHARON PHILLIPS
Brighton, Mass.
Villanova, Pa. — IT was the most heart-wrenching moment of our lives, and all I could do was stare at the tissue box.
A week earlier, my pregnant wife, Jennifer, had undergone a routine prenatal ultrasound that revealed “soft markers” suggestive of genetic abnormalities. Now we were in the consultation room awaiting the results of the amniocentesis, which would conclusively determine whether our daughter would be born with Down syndrome.
Of course they don’t put you in the room with the industrial-strength Kleenex just to tell you everything’s going to be fine. After the doctors gave us the news, they casually told us how an in utero diagnosis of Down syndrome meant perhaps a 50-50 chance of miscarriage or stillbirth.
If our daughter somehow made it to full term, her expected life span would be far shorter than a typical child’s, and she’d most likely have a whole host of medical issues requiring a lifetime of medical care. Then consider the cognitive impairments, special education programs and social ostracism. It was a lot to take in.
Hammering home the momentous difficulties that would await us as parents was clearly a tactical move by the doctor to push us toward an abortion.
That abortion is not the exception, but rather the expectation in cases of Down syndrome, is not limited to medical professionals. Though precise numbers are unavailable, at least two-thirds and as many as 90 percent of fetuses found to have Down syndrome in utero are aborted. Public opinion polls show that Americans are significantly less critical of abortion in the case of mental or physical impairment. Even the Dalai Lama says it is understandable.
So it raised eyebrows when we — a couple of pro-choice liberals — informed our doctors that we had chosen not to terminate the pregnancy. There was pushback: Did we not understand the decision?
We were sure that we’d love and care for our child regardless of her abilities. Today, despite complications and frustrations beyond those of raising a typical child, Sophia is an exuberant 8-year-old, soaking up the last rays of summer fun before entering third grade.
We have never had second thoughts, even though we understand why some parents might choose otherwise. Which is why it was particularly distressing to learn that this fall Ohio is likely to become the second state (after North Dakota) to outlaw abortion after an in utero diagnosis of Down syndrome.
The Ohio bill may be just the latest maneuver by pro-life conservatives in their war to curtail a woman’s right to choose. But as my wife and I learned, when it comes to abortion and special needs, there is no easy answer — and the idea that these deeply personal ethical and social decisions could simply be legislated away is ridiculous.
Both conservative lawmakers and their liberal opponents have surprisingly little understanding of the special-needs theater of engagement they’ve stumbled into.
For one thing, conventional pro-life versus pro-choice debates quickly become tinged with overtones about “slippery-slope” genocide, predicting the eventual disappearance of people with Down syndrome as a group. Such claims are often hysterical, but they’re not ungrounded: As our ability to screen for “undesirable” genetic traits expands, so does the potential for abortion based upon those characteristics.
Importantly, the conventional social dynamics around abortion are completely reversed. Among the families of people with disabilities, you’ll find ardent pro-choice advocates (like my wife and me) who choose not to abort. And with a vast majority of diagnoses ending in abortion, you’re likely to find many strident pro-life conservatives opting for abortion in the face of such challenges.
This doesn’t mean these people are hypocrites. Rather, it shows how tricky the issue is. In a typical pregnancy, women who choose to have an abortion are often saddled with shame and social stigma, even from friends, relatives and the broader public. Meanwhile, despite recent strides, there remains significant stigma associated with being the parent of a child with special needs.
In the end, my wife and I chose to have Sophia. We had to fight for her in the face of widespread medical and societal pressures to terminate. And that was our choice.
The Ohio bill would do away with that choice, forcing everyone placed in that unenviable situation to carry to term a child with developmental disabilities, regardless of their willingness and ability to love and care for that child once it is born.
At the same time, Republicans are pushing to slash assistance programs like Medicaid at the federal level and gutting home-based care and other services in Ohio that offset at least some of the tremendous medical and financial burdens placed on families of children with disabilities. Even if it somehow cleared the insurmountable constitutional hurdles, the foreseeable long-term impact of this legislation would be increased stresses on the family, bankruptcies and an influx of children with disabilities into orphanages and foster care.
Perhaps if Ohio’s Republican legislators grappled with such difficult decisions and their consequences, they might understand the futility and hypocrisy of imposing their abstract beliefs where they don’t conform to reality.
Mark Lawrence Schrad is an assistant professor of political science at Villanova University.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/04/opini ... d=71987722
*****
To the Editor:
Re “Special Needs, Hard Decisions,” by Mark Lawrence Schrad (Op-Ed, Sept. 4):
I laud Mr. Schrad for his willingness to share his and his wife’s experience of continuing a pregnancy involving a baby with Down syndrome. But as a physician specializing in women’s health, I disagree with the premise of the article.
Abortion need not be justified to anyone at any time, nor does a decision to continue a pregnancy require justification. Women and couples know what is right for them, just as Mr. Schrad’s experience shows.
SHARON PHILLIPS
Brighton, Mass.
Anti-Abortion Groups Join Battles Over Frozen Embryos
Anti-abortion groups are seeking a foothold on a new battlefield: custody disputes over frozen embryos.
......
As scientific advances have made frozen embryos common, they have brought new complications to divorces. Most courts have treated embryos as marital property, often favoring the party that plans not to use the embryos, emphasizing a right not to be forced to procreate. Some have applied contract law, decided which half of the couple more deserved the embryos, or required mutual consent.
But anti-abortion groups argue that such cases should be decided according to the best interests of the embryos, the same legal standard used in child-custody disputes. In a friend-of-the-court brief filed last month in the Missouri dispute, they say an embryo’s most fundamental interest is to be born: “No other right is of any avail if a human being is not around to invoke it.”
More....
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/20/us/an ... d=71987722
******
Embryos Are Not Children
To the Editor:
Re “Groups Opposed to Abortion Join Fights on Frozen Embryos” (front page, Jan. 20):
Suppose a fire broke out in a fertility clinic and you had to decide to save either 12 embryos in a petri dish or a 3-year-old boy accidentally caught in the fire. Whom would you go to first? If one holds embryos equal to children, you would save the embryos over the little boy because the dish holds 12 “children.” Is this really what a pro-life advocate would do?
Embryos are not children. In fact, while still in the dish, embryos have not yet formed any specialized organ system. In natural procreation the rate of embryo loss is as high as 60 to 80 percent. Millions of embryos go to waste in natural reproduction.
The dilemma of embryo custody is reminiscent of the biblical story about King Solomon: Two women claimed to be the mother of one baby. Solomon’s solution was to cut the baby in half, which resulted in the real mother crying out, “Oh Lord, give the baby to her, just don’t kill him!” However, even King Solomon would have had a hard time doing justice in the case of McQueen vs. Gadberry, since both ex-husband and wife equally share parenthood.
The pro-life advocates claim that the embryo has “personhood rights,” yet this would imply that the embryo, with no life yet breathed into it, has the upper hand over the adult biological father.
AVNER HERSHLAG
Manhasset, N.Y.
The writer, an obstetrician, is chief of the North Shore-L.I.J. Center for Human Reproduction.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/01/opini ... inion&_r=0
Anti-abortion groups are seeking a foothold on a new battlefield: custody disputes over frozen embryos.
......
As scientific advances have made frozen embryos common, they have brought new complications to divorces. Most courts have treated embryos as marital property, often favoring the party that plans not to use the embryos, emphasizing a right not to be forced to procreate. Some have applied contract law, decided which half of the couple more deserved the embryos, or required mutual consent.
But anti-abortion groups argue that such cases should be decided according to the best interests of the embryos, the same legal standard used in child-custody disputes. In a friend-of-the-court brief filed last month in the Missouri dispute, they say an embryo’s most fundamental interest is to be born: “No other right is of any avail if a human being is not around to invoke it.”
More....
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/20/us/an ... d=71987722
******
Embryos Are Not Children
To the Editor:
Re “Groups Opposed to Abortion Join Fights on Frozen Embryos” (front page, Jan. 20):
Suppose a fire broke out in a fertility clinic and you had to decide to save either 12 embryos in a petri dish or a 3-year-old boy accidentally caught in the fire. Whom would you go to first? If one holds embryos equal to children, you would save the embryos over the little boy because the dish holds 12 “children.” Is this really what a pro-life advocate would do?
Embryos are not children. In fact, while still in the dish, embryos have not yet formed any specialized organ system. In natural procreation the rate of embryo loss is as high as 60 to 80 percent. Millions of embryos go to waste in natural reproduction.
The dilemma of embryo custody is reminiscent of the biblical story about King Solomon: Two women claimed to be the mother of one baby. Solomon’s solution was to cut the baby in half, which resulted in the real mother crying out, “Oh Lord, give the baby to her, just don’t kill him!” However, even King Solomon would have had a hard time doing justice in the case of McQueen vs. Gadberry, since both ex-husband and wife equally share parenthood.
The pro-life advocates claim that the embryo has “personhood rights,” yet this would imply that the embryo, with no life yet breathed into it, has the upper hand over the adult biological father.
AVNER HERSHLAG
Manhasset, N.Y.
The writer, an obstetrician, is chief of the North Shore-L.I.J. Center for Human Reproduction.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/01/opini ... inion&_r=0
Surge of Zika Virus Has Brazilians Re-examining Strict Abortion Laws
RECIFE, Brazil — The surging medical reports of babies being born with unusually small heads during the Zika epidemic in Brazil are igniting a fierce debate over the country’s abortion laws, which make the procedure illegal under most circumstances.
Legal scholars in Brasília, the capital, are preparing a case to go before Brazil’s highest court, saying pregnant women should be permitted to have abortions when their fetuses are found to have abnormally small heads, a condition known as microcephaly that Brazilian researchers say is linked to the virus.
A judge in central Brazil has taken the rare step of publicly proclaiming that he will allow women to have legal abortions in cases of microcephaly, preparing the way for a fight over the issue in parts of the country’s labyrinthine legal system.
More...
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/04/world ... d=45305309
RECIFE, Brazil — The surging medical reports of babies being born with unusually small heads during the Zika epidemic in Brazil are igniting a fierce debate over the country’s abortion laws, which make the procedure illegal under most circumstances.
Legal scholars in Brasília, the capital, are preparing a case to go before Brazil’s highest court, saying pregnant women should be permitted to have abortions when their fetuses are found to have abnormally small heads, a condition known as microcephaly that Brazilian researchers say is linked to the virus.
A judge in central Brazil has taken the rare step of publicly proclaiming that he will allow women to have legal abortions in cases of microcephaly, preparing the way for a fight over the issue in parts of the country’s labyrinthine legal system.
More...
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/04/world ... d=45305309
How to Talk About Abortion
When moral philosophers and others take up an issue that is at the center of public debate, we tend to frame it as a matter of individual ethics. Is it morally permissible to eat meat? To offer money for sex? To have an abortion? Yet, such questions often fail to focus on the issues that are important and relevant for public policy and, as a result, can derail productive public debate.
The problem is that questions like these oversimplify the issues. Consider, for instance, that “abortion” is really an umbrella term for a number of different medical procedures — appropriate for different stages of pregnancy — each with significantly different health risks. Abortion is first and foremost a medical service or procedure, not an individual action, and thus a more important and relevant question for public policy is, Under what circumstances, or for what reasons, should a government prohibit properly trained medical professionals from performing an abortion? This is a question that fellow citizens can productively debate, and that may lead to a consensus.
The relevant public policy question raises issues of medical privacy, limits on governmental power, and the protection of public health, all of which as citizens we need to debate as a matter of social ethics and political values. The individual or personal ethics question — on the moral acceptability of abortion — is not likely to generate a public consensus, given the current lack of agreement on many background issues.
More...
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/19/opin ... dline&te=1
When moral philosophers and others take up an issue that is at the center of public debate, we tend to frame it as a matter of individual ethics. Is it morally permissible to eat meat? To offer money for sex? To have an abortion? Yet, such questions often fail to focus on the issues that are important and relevant for public policy and, as a result, can derail productive public debate.
The problem is that questions like these oversimplify the issues. Consider, for instance, that “abortion” is really an umbrella term for a number of different medical procedures — appropriate for different stages of pregnancy — each with significantly different health risks. Abortion is first and foremost a medical service or procedure, not an individual action, and thus a more important and relevant question for public policy is, Under what circumstances, or for what reasons, should a government prohibit properly trained medical professionals from performing an abortion? This is a question that fellow citizens can productively debate, and that may lead to a consensus.
The relevant public policy question raises issues of medical privacy, limits on governmental power, and the protection of public health, all of which as citizens we need to debate as a matter of social ethics and political values. The individual or personal ethics question — on the moral acceptability of abortion — is not likely to generate a public consensus, given the current lack of agreement on many background issues.
More...
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/19/opin ... dline&te=1
Abortion Pills Aren’t Enough to Keep Coat Hangers in the Closet
Medication abortions will not solve all the problems of a post-Roe world.
As abortion rights have come under increasing attack in the United States, commentators have held up self-administered abortion pills as a backup plan for a post-Roe world. They point to the millions of pregnant women worldwide who are using pills to self-manage abortion, citing them as an example of what reproductive health care might look like should in-clinic abortions be made illegal.
There’s no question that abortion pills are revolutionary. In the hands of women, the pills have transformed self-induced abortion from a once-dangerous endeavor into a safe procedure. Abortion help lines have walked women through the process of self-management, sometimes remotely or even over the internet. Where abortion is illegal, black market access to the drugs has resulted in significant decreases in complications and deaths.
Yet, even with these major advances, the idea that “coat-hanger abortions” are a thing of the past is misguided. The International Women’s Health Coalition welcomes do-it-yourself abortion pills as the extremely safe, effective and empowering technology they are. But we worry about the many women who will be left behind unless legal restrictions are removed, funding for abortion services is provided and barriers to access are eliminated.
More...
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/25/opin ... 3053091126
Medication abortions will not solve all the problems of a post-Roe world.
As abortion rights have come under increasing attack in the United States, commentators have held up self-administered abortion pills as a backup plan for a post-Roe world. They point to the millions of pregnant women worldwide who are using pills to self-manage abortion, citing them as an example of what reproductive health care might look like should in-clinic abortions be made illegal.
There’s no question that abortion pills are revolutionary. In the hands of women, the pills have transformed self-induced abortion from a once-dangerous endeavor into a safe procedure. Abortion help lines have walked women through the process of self-management, sometimes remotely or even over the internet. Where abortion is illegal, black market access to the drugs has resulted in significant decreases in complications and deaths.
Yet, even with these major advances, the idea that “coat-hanger abortions” are a thing of the past is misguided. The International Women’s Health Coalition welcomes do-it-yourself abortion pills as the extremely safe, effective and empowering technology they are. But we worry about the many women who will be left behind unless legal restrictions are removed, funding for abortion services is provided and barriers to access are eliminated.
More...
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/25/opin ... 3053091126
How Bangladesh Made Abortion Safer
The government’s effort to help Rohingya victims of wartime rape has lessons for the world.
Excerpt:
The M.V.A. revolutionized abortion care around the world, but in Bangladesh it did something more: It provided the rationale for a pragmatic policy and a path to limited legalization (in practice, if not in name).
A bill to legalize abortion failed to pass in the Bangladeshi Parliament in 1976, but M.R. was ruled exempt from the country’s restrictive ban, paving the way for its national rollout in 1979. Over the decade that followed, Bangladesh trained its legions of female paramedics, known as “family welfare visitors,” to perform the procedure, greatly expanding access to M.R. in a country with just one doctor for every 2,000 people.
Provided free of charge by the government and practiced at all levels of the health system, M.R. quickly came to be viewed as an essential piece of the national health care package. “It addressed a problem,” Rasheda Khan, a Bangladeshi anthropologist, told me, “without waking the sleeping lions — the religious fundamentalists.”
Bangladesh has since documented steep declines in maternal deaths, which fell by an estimated 70 percent between 1990 and 2015. Much of that owes to dramatic increases in the prevalence of contraceptive use, which has helped halve the country’s fertility rate, and better access to health facilities. But many believe M.R. played an important role, and even as Republican administrations have withheld aid to the N.G.O.s that support its implementation, successive Bangladeshi governments have kept the program afloat.
With the equipment and expertise in place, humanitarian agencies were able to discreetly deliver M.R. to Rohingya refugees soon after they started arriving. “We decided, for the Rohingya, we have to respond to their need,” said Dr. Sayed Rubayet, the Bangladesh country director of Ipas, the nonprofit tapped to oversee the delivery of M.R. to Rohingya refugees.
By early October, Ipas had trained health workers in eight facilities serving the camps. It has since expanded the training to 33, and other groups have joined the effort, making abortion care one of the standard health services available to Rohingya refugees.
More...
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/28/opin ... dline&te=1
The government’s effort to help Rohingya victims of wartime rape has lessons for the world.
Excerpt:
The M.V.A. revolutionized abortion care around the world, but in Bangladesh it did something more: It provided the rationale for a pragmatic policy and a path to limited legalization (in practice, if not in name).
A bill to legalize abortion failed to pass in the Bangladeshi Parliament in 1976, but M.R. was ruled exempt from the country’s restrictive ban, paving the way for its national rollout in 1979. Over the decade that followed, Bangladesh trained its legions of female paramedics, known as “family welfare visitors,” to perform the procedure, greatly expanding access to M.R. in a country with just one doctor for every 2,000 people.
Provided free of charge by the government and practiced at all levels of the health system, M.R. quickly came to be viewed as an essential piece of the national health care package. “It addressed a problem,” Rasheda Khan, a Bangladeshi anthropologist, told me, “without waking the sleeping lions — the religious fundamentalists.”
Bangladesh has since documented steep declines in maternal deaths, which fell by an estimated 70 percent between 1990 and 2015. Much of that owes to dramatic increases in the prevalence of contraceptive use, which has helped halve the country’s fertility rate, and better access to health facilities. But many believe M.R. played an important role, and even as Republican administrations have withheld aid to the N.G.O.s that support its implementation, successive Bangladeshi governments have kept the program afloat.
With the equipment and expertise in place, humanitarian agencies were able to discreetly deliver M.R. to Rohingya refugees soon after they started arriving. “We decided, for the Rohingya, we have to respond to their need,” said Dr. Sayed Rubayet, the Bangladesh country director of Ipas, the nonprofit tapped to oversee the delivery of M.R. to Rohingya refugees.
By early October, Ipas had trained health workers in eight facilities serving the camps. It has since expanded the training to 33, and other groups have joined the effort, making abortion care one of the standard health services available to Rohingya refugees.
More...
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/28/opin ... dline&te=1
The Abortion Wars Have Become a Fight Over Science
Forty-six years after Roe, the two camps increasingly disagree on basic facts about abortion — and who has the authority to determine them.
It was perhaps, at first glance, an unusual feature of the 2019 March for Life that it downplayed what many have come to think of as the central claim of the anti-abortion movement: that the unborn have a constitutional right to life.
Instead, march organizers focused on proclaiming that science was on their side. They circulated material on “when human life begins,” whether abortions are ever medically necessary and when fetal life becomes viable. They praised legal restrictions based on what science supposedly says about fetal pain.
In return, abortion-rights advocates, citing studies from the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and the University of California, San Francisco, fired back that the March for Life peddles “junk science” and that its positions “fly in the face of evidence.”
This year’s skirmish wasn’t actually unusual, however. Rather, it was revealing of a larger shift in the terms of the abortion debate. Over the past few decades, the abortion wars have become as much a fight about science and medicine as they are about the law and the Constitution.
More...
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/22/opin ... dline&te=1
Forty-six years after Roe, the two camps increasingly disagree on basic facts about abortion — and who has the authority to determine them.
It was perhaps, at first glance, an unusual feature of the 2019 March for Life that it downplayed what many have come to think of as the central claim of the anti-abortion movement: that the unborn have a constitutional right to life.
Instead, march organizers focused on proclaiming that science was on their side. They circulated material on “when human life begins,” whether abortions are ever medically necessary and when fetal life becomes viable. They praised legal restrictions based on what science supposedly says about fetal pain.
In return, abortion-rights advocates, citing studies from the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and the University of California, San Francisco, fired back that the March for Life peddles “junk science” and that its positions “fly in the face of evidence.”
This year’s skirmish wasn’t actually unusual, however. Rather, it was revealing of a larger shift in the terms of the abortion debate. Over the past few decades, the abortion wars have become as much a fight about science and medicine as they are about the law and the Constitution.
More...
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/22/opin ... dline&te=1
Farman of Imam Mowlana Sultan Muhammad Shah
"The immediate religious duty of all my spiritual children to learn perfect infant care from conception till maturity. The unnecessary death rate must be reduced.
It is not only saving of lives but of souls. Each child saved may be some day a missionary, a teacher of faith and love of God, the Prophet, Aly and his successors."
"The immediate religious duty of all my spiritual children to learn perfect infant care from conception till maturity. The unnecessary death rate must be reduced.
It is not only saving of lives but of souls. Each child saved may be some day a missionary, a teacher of faith and love of God, the Prophet, Aly and his successors."
Life Begins at Conception (Except When That’s Inconvenient for Republicans)
It’s almost as if abortion bans aren’t actually about “life” at all.
When, exactly, do abortion opponents think life begins?
Over the past few months there has been a rush to pass abortion bans. Most of these bans center on the idea that abortions should be banned as soon as the fetal heartbeat is detected; that’s because “a heartbeat proves that there’s life that deserves protection under law,” according to a state representative in Kentucky, Robert Goforth.
On the other hand, many, including Mr. Goforth himself, also believe “life begins at conception,” as Tom Cotton, the Republican senator from Arkansas, said on “Meet the Press” last month. Or to take it still further, that the blastocyst, that clump of cells smaller than a raspberry that forms in the early days after a sperm meets an egg, is a person. As an Alabama state representative, Terri Collins, put it: “This bill addresses that one issue. Is that baby in the womb a person? I believe our law says it is. I believe our people say it is. And I believe technology shows it is.”
And yet.
Representative Collins recently sponsored what is arguably the most extreme abortion ban to pass to date — Alabama’s near total prohibition of the procedure, with no exceptions for rape or incest. But this ban does have one exception: Fertilized eggs, blastocysts, five-day-old embryos — people, according to some definitions — are exempt and can be destroyed, so long as they are not contained in the body of a woman. “The egg in the lab doesn’t apply,” said Clyde Chambliss, a state senator and another sponsor of the abortion bill. “It’s not in a woman. She’s not pregnant.”
But I was told by Tom Cotton that life began at conception?
In May, an appellate court in Ohio, in theory, delivered another blow to the “life begins at conception” school of abortion banning, though none of its members seem to have taken notice. Frozen embryos are not people, it told a couple whose embryos had been lost in a fertility clinic storage tank malfunction. (Ohio, by the way, was one of the states to pass a heartbeat bill — and so, technically, no inconsistencies here!)
More..
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/08/opin ... y_20190610
It’s almost as if abortion bans aren’t actually about “life” at all.
When, exactly, do abortion opponents think life begins?
Over the past few months there has been a rush to pass abortion bans. Most of these bans center on the idea that abortions should be banned as soon as the fetal heartbeat is detected; that’s because “a heartbeat proves that there’s life that deserves protection under law,” according to a state representative in Kentucky, Robert Goforth.
On the other hand, many, including Mr. Goforth himself, also believe “life begins at conception,” as Tom Cotton, the Republican senator from Arkansas, said on “Meet the Press” last month. Or to take it still further, that the blastocyst, that clump of cells smaller than a raspberry that forms in the early days after a sperm meets an egg, is a person. As an Alabama state representative, Terri Collins, put it: “This bill addresses that one issue. Is that baby in the womb a person? I believe our law says it is. I believe our people say it is. And I believe technology shows it is.”
And yet.
Representative Collins recently sponsored what is arguably the most extreme abortion ban to pass to date — Alabama’s near total prohibition of the procedure, with no exceptions for rape or incest. But this ban does have one exception: Fertilized eggs, blastocysts, five-day-old embryos — people, according to some definitions — are exempt and can be destroyed, so long as they are not contained in the body of a woman. “The egg in the lab doesn’t apply,” said Clyde Chambliss, a state senator and another sponsor of the abortion bill. “It’s not in a woman. She’s not pregnant.”
But I was told by Tom Cotton that life began at conception?
In May, an appellate court in Ohio, in theory, delivered another blow to the “life begins at conception” school of abortion banning, though none of its members seem to have taken notice. Frozen embryos are not people, it told a couple whose embryos had been lost in a fertility clinic storage tank malfunction. (Ohio, by the way, was one of the states to pass a heartbeat bill — and so, technically, no inconsistencies here!)
More..
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/08/opin ... y_20190610
I Asked Thousands of Biologists When Life Begins. The Answer Wasn’t Popular
Shortly after being awarded my Ph.D. by the University of Chicago’s department of Comparative Human Development this year, I found myself in a minor media whirlwind. I was interviewed by The Daily Wire, The College Fix, and Breitbart. I appeared on national television and on a widely syndicated radio program. All of this interest had been prompted by a working paper associated with my dissertation, which was entitled Balancing Abortion Rights and Fetal Rights: A Mixed Methods Mediation of the U.S. Abortion Debate.
As discussed in more detail below, I reported that both a majority of pro-choice Americans (53%) and a majority of pro-life Americans (54%) would support a comprehensive policy compromise that provides entitlements to pregnant women, improves the adoption process for parents, permits abortion in extreme circumstances, and restricts elective abortion after the first trimester. However, members of the media were mostly interested in my finding that 96% of the 5,577 biologists who responded to me affirmed the view that a human life begins at fertilization.
It was the reporting of this view—that human zygotes, embryos, and fetuses are biological humans—that created such a strong backlash. It was not unexpected, as the finding provides fodder for conservative opponents of Roe v. Wade, the 1973 case in which the U.S. Supreme Court had suggested there was no consensus on “the difficult question of when life begins” and that “the judiciary, at this point in the development of man’s knowledge, [was] not in a position to speculate as to the answer.”
More...
https://quillette.com/2019/10/16/i-aske ... t-popular/
Shortly after being awarded my Ph.D. by the University of Chicago’s department of Comparative Human Development this year, I found myself in a minor media whirlwind. I was interviewed by The Daily Wire, The College Fix, and Breitbart. I appeared on national television and on a widely syndicated radio program. All of this interest had been prompted by a working paper associated with my dissertation, which was entitled Balancing Abortion Rights and Fetal Rights: A Mixed Methods Mediation of the U.S. Abortion Debate.
As discussed in more detail below, I reported that both a majority of pro-choice Americans (53%) and a majority of pro-life Americans (54%) would support a comprehensive policy compromise that provides entitlements to pregnant women, improves the adoption process for parents, permits abortion in extreme circumstances, and restricts elective abortion after the first trimester. However, members of the media were mostly interested in my finding that 96% of the 5,577 biologists who responded to me affirmed the view that a human life begins at fertilization.
It was the reporting of this view—that human zygotes, embryos, and fetuses are biological humans—that created such a strong backlash. It was not unexpected, as the finding provides fodder for conservative opponents of Roe v. Wade, the 1973 case in which the U.S. Supreme Court had suggested there was no consensus on “the difficult question of when life begins” and that “the judiciary, at this point in the development of man’s knowledge, [was] not in a position to speculate as to the answer.”
More...
https://quillette.com/2019/10/16/i-aske ... t-popular/
Abortion by Telemedicine: A Growing Option as Access to Clinics Wanes
The coronavirus has created a surge in demand for telemedicine of all types — including for a quietly expanding program for terminating pregnancies.
Ashley Dale was grateful she could end her pregnancy at home.
As her 3-year-old daughter played nearby, she spoke by video from her living room in Hawaii with Dr. Bliss Kaneshiro, an obstetrician-gynecologist, who was a 200-mile plane ride away in Honolulu. The doctor explained that two medicines that would be mailed to Ms. Dale would halt her pregnancy and cause a miscarriage.
“Does it sound like what you want to do in terms of terminating the pregnancy?” Dr. Kaneshiro asked gently. Ms. Dale, who said she would love to have another baby, had wrestled with the decision, but circumstances involving an estranged boyfriend had made the choice clear: “It does,” she replied.
Abortion through telemedicine is a quietly growing phenomenon, driven in part by restrictions from conservative states and the Trump administration that have limited access and increased the distance many women must travel to abortion clinics.
Now, the coronavirus pandemic is catapulting demand for telemedicine abortion to a new level, with much of the nation under strict stay-at-home advisories and as several states, including Arkansas, Oklahoma and Texas, have sought to suspend access to surgical abortions during the crisis.
The telemedicine program that Ms. Dale participated in has been allowed to operate as a research study for several years under a special arrangement with the Food and Drug Administration. It allows women seeking abortions to have video consultations with certified doctors and then receive abortion pills by mail to take on their own.
More...
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/28/heal ... 778d3e6de3
The coronavirus has created a surge in demand for telemedicine of all types — including for a quietly expanding program for terminating pregnancies.
Ashley Dale was grateful she could end her pregnancy at home.
As her 3-year-old daughter played nearby, she spoke by video from her living room in Hawaii with Dr. Bliss Kaneshiro, an obstetrician-gynecologist, who was a 200-mile plane ride away in Honolulu. The doctor explained that two medicines that would be mailed to Ms. Dale would halt her pregnancy and cause a miscarriage.
“Does it sound like what you want to do in terms of terminating the pregnancy?” Dr. Kaneshiro asked gently. Ms. Dale, who said she would love to have another baby, had wrestled with the decision, but circumstances involving an estranged boyfriend had made the choice clear: “It does,” she replied.
Abortion through telemedicine is a quietly growing phenomenon, driven in part by restrictions from conservative states and the Trump administration that have limited access and increased the distance many women must travel to abortion clinics.
Now, the coronavirus pandemic is catapulting demand for telemedicine abortion to a new level, with much of the nation under strict stay-at-home advisories and as several states, including Arkansas, Oklahoma and Texas, have sought to suspend access to surgical abortions during the crisis.
The telemedicine program that Ms. Dale participated in has been allowed to operate as a research study for several years under a special arrangement with the Food and Drug Administration. It allows women seeking abortions to have video consultations with certified doctors and then receive abortion pills by mail to take on their own.
More...
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/28/heal ... 778d3e6de3