ISSUES
: Abortion
Chapter 2: Abortion debate
26
Prosecutions under the OAPA are
happening. Just before Christmas,
a young mother from County
Durham was jailed for two-and-
a-half years for inducing her
pregnancy in the third trimester
using pills obtained online. Later
abortions may raise particular
moral concerns for many people,
but the imprisonment of women
should equally so. We know that
even women well within the legal
limit are obtaining abortion pills
online. They may be young women
too scared to tell their parents,
they may be victims of domestic
violence who worry their partner
will find out if they visit a clinic.
They may also be women who do
not know how to access abortion
services, or are unable to do so
because of their asylum status.
The accessibility of this medication
means the risk of women breaking
the law is now greater than at any
point since 1967.
We may question whether these
women would be handed the life
sentence that can accompany
unlawful abortion. But that is
beside the point. If we do not
think women should go to prison
for ending their own pregnancy
we should not accept a law that
says they should. Taking abortion
out of the criminal law will not lead
to more women taking their own
health into their hands in this way.
But decriminalising this procedure
– which has enabled women to live
their lives as they see fit and bear
their children at the time they think
is right – would acknowledge and
help destigmatise the experience
of the one in three women who will
need an abortion in their lifetimes.
Please support the We Trust
Women campaign today.
12 February 2016
Ö
The above information is
reprinted with kind permission
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© Progress 2016
Legal abortion until term?
U
K abortion provider BPAS
has launched a campaign
to legalise abortion-on-
demand, up-to-birth, for any
reason. Parliament is considering
debating the issue. For more
information on this see http://
-
opinion/abortion-up-to-birth/
The following are my own personal
reflections:
My daughter was born at 27
weeks gestational age. She came
unexpectedly early, weighed just
2lbs and looked very fragile. Yet
she was perfectly formed, alive
and a fighter from the beginning. I
remember her tiny fingers strongly
holding onto my index finger. She
had a good thick crop of hair,
dark eyelashes, and over the next
two weeks she would look at me
with an intense gaze, responding
physically to sound and to touch.
She remained in hospital for eight
weeks until she was well enough to
come home. By then she weighed
4lbs, but to us she looked huge!
She is now 18 and a beautiful,
resilient and determined girl. She
has had mild asthma throughout
her life and missed a fair bit of
schooling through colds and chest
infections, but that hasn’t stopped
her from achieving and living a full
life and is about to start university.
We had a repeat episode in
neonatal intensive care when six
years later our son was born. At 26
weeks, he was even a week earlier
than our daughter. Like her, he has
developed and grown well and is
very healthy.
There has been no known reason for
my premature labours. I wouldn’t
wish on anyone the emotional
rollercoaster of the first few weeks
of being a parent of a premature
baby, but it did place my husband
and I in a unique position to view
(and for many, many hours!) first
hand the development of a baby
from 26 weeks, which is normally
unseen in the womb.
It is one thing to read objectively
that the unborn baby is capable
of hearing, feeling pain and
sensory stimuli. As early as seven
to ten weeks, a baby’s moves are
developed including hiccupping,
frowning, squinting, furrowing the
brow, pursing the lips, moving
individual arms and legs, head
turning, touching the face,
breathing (without air), stretching,
opening the mouth, yawning and
sucking. At six months baby will be
able to hear, and he or she nestles
in her favourite positions to sleep,
and stretches upon waking up.[1]
It was incredible to witness this
development of a pre-termer
first hand. Speak to any mother
of a premature baby born after
22 weeks – they will tell you that
it isn’t an unfeeling foetus that
they’ve given birth to; it is a unique,
sensitive and responsive baby,
already a ‘person’.
Which is why the upper time limit
of our country’s abortion law, the
cut-off point when an abortion is
legally allowed to be carried out,
already falls too high, at 24 weeks.
Seven in ten women want a lower
time limit for abortion, as more and
more babies born before 24 weeks
of gestation survive. A ComRes
poll conducted in May 2008 found
that 72% of women thought the
cut-off point for abortion should be
earlier in light of improved survival
rates among babies born at a stage
when they could legally have been
aborted. 73% of women said that
the limit should be lowered to 20
weeks or below, given that the limit
is no more than 12 weeks in most
other EU countries.[2]
It is also why I was particularly
concerned to read The Telegraph’s
article this week[3] about the ‘We
Trust Women’ campaign. The
premise is that women know what’s
best for themselves and shouldn’t
face prosecution if they self-induce
abortion of their unborn child, even
through third trimester up until
term.
The article states: “The British
Pregnancy
Advisory
Service
(BPAS) has now launched a
campaign to finally decriminalise
