Posted on 04/03/2005 8:30:24 PM PDT by Pikamax
Leading abortion clinic backs 20-week limit By Becky Barrow (Filed: 04/04/2005)
One of Britain's largest abortion clinics wants to cut the upper limit for terminations to 20 weeks because advances in medical science mean that the babies are "potentially viable".
Marie Stopes International, the largest provider of abortions outside the NHS, said yesterday it wants the controversial 24-week limit - the highest in Europe - to be cut by four weeks.
Dr Tim Black, chief executive of Marie Stopes International, which performs around 60,000 abortions each year, said: "Public opinion is in favour of abortion but falls off quite quickly when we get to 20 weeks because there is a perception that the foetus is potentially viable. We do feel that in light of medical developments the upper limit should come down."
A spokesman for Marie Stopes said yesterday it has held that view "privately" for some time but has now decided to go public at a time when abortion has become once again a highly political issue.
It said it was aware that it might be treated "like a pariah" for having gone public.
Last month, Michael Howard, the Tory leader, reignited the debate after saying during an interview with Cosmopolitan magazine that he would be in favour of reducing the upper limit to 22 or 20 weeks. Several religious leaders supported his decision.
A Telegraph poll last month showed that most people, including a large majority of women, agree with him that the upper limit should be cut back.
It found that 55 per cent of voters of both sexes would welcome new laws reducing the time limit.
Those findings, coupled with yesterday's announcement, could put pressure on politicians such as Tony Blair to reconsider their belief that the current law should be left as it is.
But Marie Stopes said it would support a reduction only if the "ridiculous and anachronistic" law that a woman cannot obtain an abortion without written permission from two doctors was abolished. It would agree with the upper limit being cut to 20 weeks only if a woman could have an abortion before the 12th week of her pregnancy "on demand" without having to obtain permission.
A spokesman said many women who visited one of Marie Stopes's nine clinics in England tried to have an abortion in the very early stages of pregnancy but were delayed by a month or more due to delays or difficulties speaking to a doctor.
Abortions performed in the first three months of a pregnancy are much more straightforward than later terminations as they do not require a general anaesthetic.
Of the 181,600 abortions performed in England and Wales in 2003, 87 per cent were on women less than 13 weeks pregnant.
The most common age to have an abortion is between 20 and 24. Just one per cent of abortions are performed because the baby would be born handicapped. Dr Black said: "If we brought the limit down to 20 weeks but made abortion more readily available up to 12 weeks, that would be reasonable."
The Society for the Protection of Unborn Children said it was "very wary" of proposals to reduce the limit because they were always linked to other moves, such as waiving the need for doctors' consent, which could increase the number of abortions.
Paul Tully, the general secretary, said: "Any reduction in the number of abortions would be welcome. However, reducing time limits doesn't necessarily mean reducing abortions. The last time MPs thought they had a chance to reduce the time limit, they ended up widening the law.
"Abortions have continued to rise to record levels since. One must consider carefully what effect any given proposal will have."
The issue of the "viability" of babies born around 24 weeks was the subject of a recent BBC Panorama documentary about the findings of a study of babies born only a few weeks after the mothers were just halfway through their pregnancy. Of 26 children who survived in 1995 after being born at 23 weeks, just three went on to have no impairment or disability.
It's amazing to realize that all Euro abortion laws are actually stricter than ours. We are supposed to be the religious people, they the hedonists, but actually their laws on abortion are more restrictive. I don't know how closely they are obeyed, but they are on the books.
I'd like to see a law for no abortions after 20 weeks, heck 24 weeks introduced here, in America. We must have the Scandos coming over here for late abortions, how nice.
Technology eventually will (if it hasn't already) render the viability question in regards to abortion moot.
Viability will be from conception.
We should argue in these terms to get/stay ahead of the curve.
[Just one per cent of abortions are performed because the baby would be born handicapped. ]
And the other 99% of abortions are performed mostly because the woman doesn't want the inconvenience of a child, just like in America.
I think when abortion doctors and nurses - who are naturally trained in intellectual talent and have devoted years of unwaivering dedication to their profession - are forced to deal with pathetic giggling street kids who come in every month for another abortion... they begin to resent the immaturity they have to deal with, and start questioning their belief in "reproductive rights".
That's my theory.
Inch-by-inch reclaiming ground for good. It is always so hard to go back once righteousness is lost, and the battle never ends.
Viability will be from conception.
We should argue in these terms
Not quite. Rather than get bogged down in unprovable techno-speculation, we should argue that one's right to life can't possibly depend on the state of technology at one's conception.
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