Posted on 07/02/2002 4:13:58 PM PDT by Pokey78
The procedure, says the doctor, is perfectly harmless. The patient complies. Later, however, she returns and says that it has, in fact, made her ill. Nonsense, says the doctor: you must have been ill in the first place. I wasn't, she says. Well, you're ill now, says the doctor; and, since my operation can't possibly make anyone ill, you must have been ill beforehand.
Gillian Penny of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists recently made the gloriously sweeping statement that women who had abortions did not usually suffer psychological problems unless they were already disturbed.
Her remarks came in response to the news that a young woman was planning to sue the NHS for post-abortion psychological trauma. Dr Penny was not the doctor who performed the operation, but she felt able to say: "I would suggest that this woman perhaps did have pre-existing psychological problems."
It is a tenet of post-feminist liberalism that abortion is good for you - your foremothers fought for it, that's why. So any evidence that it might have a negative effect on some women is inadmissible.
But common sense tells us that some post-abortion psychological trauma is so likely as to be almost inevitable, for numerous reasons. Suspend, for a moment, your ideology. For most of history, to induce abortion has been a crime inspiring the deepest moral outrage; whatever we think now of these earlier values, is it likely that, in one generation, we could eradicate all guilt at something so recently regarded with such revulsion?
Moreover, every reader probably knows at least one woman who was initially horrified to discover herself pregnant, only to give birth to a child on whom she subsequently doted. If despair followed by delight is such a common feature of childbearing, isn't it at least a possibility that some women, having terminated their pregnancies, will later have regrets?
In fact, there is evidence aplenty. In 1989, the journal Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics followed 83 post-abortion patients, and found 30 suffering "anniversary reactions", often psychosomatic symptoms, on the date either of the abortion or when the baby should have been born. In 1992, Zolese and Blacker (British Journal of Psychiatry) summarised previous research to discover a "marked, severe or persistent psychiatric illness" in an average of 10 per cent of post-abortive women.
In 1996, Kitamura (Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics) demonstrated the link between abortion and ante-natal depression in subsequent pregnancies. In the same year, Gissler et al. (British Medical Journal) reported that a woman's risk of suicide trebles after an abortion (whereas it halves after childbirth).
Can all this be swept away, on the grounds that these women were already unstable? Are women who have abortions statistically more likely to be psychologically vulnerable, for instance? Here, the findings are even more disturbing. In 2001, Cagnacci and Volpe (Human Reproduction) discovered a seasonal pattern in abortions mirroring seasonal suicide (peaking in May and dipping in November), suggesting that women are more likely to seek abortion when their mood is temporarily low. This helps explain why some women may regret an abortion, after their seasonally depressed mood has passed.
More worrying still, as far back as 1972 (Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics), research showed that a previous history of psychiatric illness meant that a woman was more likely to be counselled to abort. But if it is known that abortion can exacerbate depression, surely vulnerable women should be warned of the possible psychological dangers of the operation? Abortion is supposed to be about choice. Genuine choice is informed.
The complaint currently being made against the NHS is that the patient in question was not told. As it happens, she works in the health service and knows it is good practice to give information of the risks of any operation. The need for such information is surely more compelling if the operation is not medically necessary. What possible motive can there be for silence on the subject?
Three reasons suggest themselves. The tackiest and most obvious is financial. Half the abortions in this country are done through private clinics. Doctors may find the operation distasteful, but there is no denying that it is lucrative.
The second is the wording of the 1967 Abortion Act. Abortion is still illegal unless two doctors agree that the risk to the mother's mental or physical health is greater if the pregnancy is continued. As we all know, almost any two busy doctors will sign the wretched thing: if she doesn't want to have the baby, it is presumably better for her mental health not to. On the other hand, if the evidence shows that abortion can endanger her mental health more than having an unwanted baby, this blows an enormous hole in the Act - or rather the way it is interpreted - and makes all the doctors look like asses, or worse.
Lastly, of course, there is political correctness. You can't question abortion, even though some of the risks are well established. One study, using data from the Office of National Statistics, has estimated that there are already 16,000 women in England and Wales who have developed breast cancer as a direct result of abortion, and this could rise to a total of 300,000 by 2023. Abortion, however, is beyond debate: a woman's right to choose. But is it a free choice?
How many young women are driven, metaphorically as well as literally, to the clinic by someone else? Probably the most frightening discovery of all (Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, 1989) is that women instigate only 30 per cent of abortions. The rest are suggested by parents (seven per cent), friends (10 per cent), doctors (20 per cent) and (an appalling 33 per cent) partners - partners who will not suffer the adverse effects.
It is really bad for the mental health of those that are aborted.
More than they found for second hand smoke. Were are the people who are outraged over public health? Helloo? Helllloooooo?
Yepper! Blood money from the lives of the innocent.
Planned Parenthood is rolling in blood money. Gotta get those public school kids to have sex, sex, sex. More money, money, money. $$$$
Next they should add warning labels on the Planned Parenthood pamphlets. The public has the right to know if they could die. They do it for cigaretts because of their link to cancer, right?
Ah ha! Get politicians to add a sin tax to abortions, too. How about a 150% mark up for Uncle Sam?
I think the genie's been let out of the bottle now.
Still looking for the article here......
Pregnancy in which implantation occurs outside the endometrium and endometrial cavity--ie, in the cervix, uterine tube, ovary, or abdominal or pelvic cavity.
The incidence (1 in 100 to 200 diagnosed pregnancies) is rising and is higher among nonwhites. Having had a tubal disorder, an ectopic pregnancy (10 to 25%), exposure to DES, or an induced abortion increases the risk of ectopic pregnancy. The risk of pregnancy (including ectopic) with an intrauterine device in place is small (see Ch. 246); however, if pregnancy does occur, the risk of an ectopic pregnancy is much higher than normal
Good catch.
I don't expect that even the staunchest pro-life person would be opposed to an abortion in the case of an ectopic pregnancy.
In the end, what this is really about is sex. The radical left wants to be able to have as much sex as they want, when they want it, and how they want, and are outraged that anyone in our society might look down on that behavior. If I may put it in theological terms, they want to be able to gratify the sinful nature, and teach others to do the same.
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