Australia

Abortion and conscience in Australia

October 5, 2008 by Andrea Mrozek Leave a Comment

Thousands gather to protest a new abortion law in Australia, one that looks like it also forces doctors to refer for an abortion. News report here, while an op-ed offers this:

Maybe the doctors with the strong objections should consider a niche that won’t challenge their moral views.

Maybe doctors with strong pro-choice views, those unable to distinguish between what constitutes medical care versus what is a political statement ought to consider a niche that doesn’t challenge good medicine? (Recall the words of Dr. Gutowski: “So with doctors, we are human beings, we get influenced by political things just like everybody else, and so we forget our science–that the fetus is a genetically distinct individual. We as scientists should be dealing with the science, not the politics–but it takes us a while to really think the whole thing through.”)

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Rebecca adds: Of course, this isn’t about access to information – if the real concern were that women whose doctors are pro-life might not be able to find an abortionist, why not just let abortion advocacy groups put big ads in the yellow pages, magazines, city buses and so on (you know, as is already the case. And I have yet to meet a woman who decided against abortion on the grounds that it was just to hard to track down a provider, darn it.)

No, it’s not about access, it’s about power. Political candidates are muzzled all the time about abortion: you can vote your conscience and believe as you wish, as long as you toe the line about abortion. Protestors are censored about abortion: you have the right to free speech, as long as you’re nowhere near an abortion clinic. Now doctors are being put up against a wall: you should use your clinical judgement, and the Hippocratic Oath, to govern your behaviour, unless it involves abortion. Enough.

But if we’re going to compel pro-life doctors to hand out contact info for abortion clinics, can we simultaneously compel abortion clinics to hand out info about the implications of abortion for mental health, breast cancer, and future child-bearing? Or would it be inappropriately political to require doctors to give their patients the facts they really need to give informed consent?

Choosing life and limb

June 11, 2008 by Tanya Zaleski Leave a Comment

Woman 18 weeks pregnant discovers her “unborn baby may lose both its feet.” Obviously, women have aborted later for less severe conditions. (I’m reminded of a third trimester abortion due to a cleft-palate diagnosis.)

Operate while still in the womb and there were risks to both mother and child. Do nothing and their daughter faced a lifetime of walking aids and difficulty.

Doctors at the Monash Medical Centre decided that to save their daughter Leah’s feet, they would have to operate on her at 22 weeks in-utero, the earliest operation conducted on a foetus in Australia and possibly a world first.

It’s interesting to note that the operation was conducted by a pediatric surgeon. Definitely puts a different spin on sayings things like ‘My body, my choice,’ and ‘One body. One person. One count.’ I wonder if pro-choice feminists will be up in arms at the idea that a woman was treated by a doctor for babies.

Mrs Bowlen said. “Just hearing the doctor say she’ll have full function in that foot and basically be able to walk. Hearing that, I know I made the right decision no matter what anyone else says.”

“My body, my choice” in Australia

March 19, 2008 by Andrea Mrozek Leave a Comment

Apparently abortion rates in Australia have precipitously declined.

We’ve plotted a sudden decline in the abortion rate that is so low it harps right back to the time when abortion was illegal and rarely practised,” said Dr Julia Shelley, of Deakin University in Melbourne.

Aha–and this is what I’m after. Women who simply don’t and won’t choose abortion, irrespective of what legislation says. We should know better for ourselves without legislation telling us.

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Rebecca adds: Fascinating. Any speculation as to the cause?

Don’t count on governments

January 8, 2008 by Andrea Mrozek Leave a Comment

What’s that quote-no policy win is permanent, no defeat everlasting? In Australia, the Howard government had banned aid to fund abortions in developing nations. Now an opposition coalition is moving to overturn that ban.

A federal Liberal MP who chairs an all-party parliamentary group wants the Rudd Labor government to end the ban on funding family planning advice for women in developing countries, calling the ban stupid and anti-women.

and

Opposition Leader Brendan Nelson said Australia must do everything it could to give people in the developing world a reasonable expectation of a healthy life.

Anti-woman? Abortions offer a healthy life? Hello, unsubstantiated opinion-goodbye reasonable effort to stop the advent of abortion in developing countries where access to basic health care is a problem, forget about abortion.

The bottom line: Don’t count on governments to stem the tide of abortion extremism. And I might add, that’s a good thing. We should be able to discern all on our own what constitutes good policy, without the reigning elite telling us.

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