‘Slippery slope’ of abortion is real

‘Slippery slope’ of abortion is real
David Quinn lays out what the Late Late Show should have asked the new Master of Rotunda hospital

Professor Fergal Malone, the new Master of the Rotunda hospital in Dublin, has been making a big public impact since his recent appointment. He has been interviewed in several newspapers and on the Late Late Show last Friday night.

Most of the attention has focussed on what he has had to say about babies suffering from a so-called ‘fatal foetal abnormality’. Under Irish law at present, killing such a baby early in the pregnancy is considered unlawful killing.

The only way the law can allow these unborn babies to be aborted rather than letting nature take its course, is by changing our Constitution, and specifically by repealing or amending the pro-life clause of our Constitution, namely Article 40.3.3.

Those who want us to repeal Article 40.3.3 are focussing very heavily on the issue of ‘fatal foetal abnormalities’ because those who have campaigned for more permissive abortion laws have always focussed on hard cases in order to persuade the public to go down the desired route.

Repeal

On the Late Late Show, Prof. Fergal Malone was categorical that he would prefer to see women whose unborn babies are suffering from a lethal handicap have their abortions in Ireland rather than having to go to Britain which is what they have to do now. Therefore, he favours repeal of Article 40.3.3.

A quick word is in order here about the terms ‘fatal foetal abnormality’ and ‘lethal abnormality’. The terms cover conditions such as Anencephaly, whereby a baby is missing major parts of its brain and skull, and Trisomy 13 or 18 whereby a child has an extra chromosome which results in severe disability.

An article published in 2012 in the British Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology (BJOG) cautions against using terms like ‘fatal foetal abnormality’ and ‘lethal abnormality’.

It points out that babies who have what should probably instead be called ‘life-limiting conditions’ can live past birth. A baby with Anencephaly will usually die within 24 hours, although in 3-5% of cases the baby can live more than a week.

Babies born with Trisomy 13 live for an average of one week and in a small minority of cases for more than a year.

Babies with Trisomy 18 survive for a week to a fortnight on average and again a small minority live for more than a year.

The obvious question arises; isn’t every human being entitled to whatever span of life they are given? This is not a question Ryan Tubridy thought to ask Prof. Malone last Friday night.

Lethal

The BJOG paper, entitled ‘Fatally flawed? A review and ethical analysis of lethal congenital malformations’, points out that when a couple is informed that their baby is suffering from a ‘fatal foetal abnormality’ and the baby survives past birth, for however short a time, there can be a major breakdown in trust between the doctors and the couple.

The paper concludes: “The term ‘lethal’, unless clearly and transparently defined, and consistently applied, should be avoided in perinatal guidelines and in counselling following prenatal diagnosis. It runs the risk of misleading couples about the prognosis of severe abnormalities.”

It becomes obvious, therefore, that terms like ‘fatal foetal abnormality’ cloud the issue rather than throw light on it. What is more, they draw the public further down the road pro-abortion campaigners want them to go, which is, of course, why they use these terms.

In his interview on the Late Late Show, Prof. Malone spoke very much from a pro-choice perspective.

He spoke about how the Rotunda equally respects parents who “choose the perinatal route”, that is, who want to bring their severely handicapped babies to term, and those parents who choose to go down the abortion route, which he described as “inducing labour several months early”.

He said that last year there were 40 cases in the Rotunda of unborn babies being diagnosed with a life-limiting handicap. Twelve of the women/couples choose to carry their child to term and 28 choose to abort.

Prof. Malone said he wished the 28 who choose to abort could have been facilitated in the Rotunda rather than having to go abroad.

He said that when they do go to a hospital in the likes of Liverpool to have their abortion, the Rotunda will often send over a medical team to acquaint the new medical team with the case and to make the couple feel more at ease.

Having said this, he added: “The right thing to do for patients who make that particular choice is to look after [the] patients in their home environment”.

Reasonable

Ryan Turbridy asked no searching questions about so-called ‘fatal foetal abnormalities’. It seemed to be taken for granted that the choice to abort in such a scenario was entirely reasonable.

He did not ask Prof. Malone what he thought about the moral status of those babies. Does he believe they enjoy their own right to life or is that right totally dependent on the opinion of the mother?

Instead, and with obvious reluctance, Tubridy put it to him that allowing abortions in these cases was the start of a “slippery slope”.

Malone more or less dodged the question by saying the “floodgates” have not opened as a result of the passage of our first abortion law in 2013. (He did say nine abortions have taken place in the Rotunda since then under the terms of that law).

In fact Prof. Malone’s support for a further widening of the grounds under which abortions may take place here demonstrates in itself the legitimacy of the slippery slope argument.

No sooner was the Protection of Life During Pregnancy Act passed, than calls were heard to repeal Article 40.3.3 entirely. Prof. Malone supports those calls. That is the ‘slippery slope’ in action.

It would also have been extremely useful to hear under what other circumstances, if any, Prof. Malone wants abortion to be permitted.

What about Down syndrome babies, for example? The section about him on the Rotunda website describes how he implemented a “national first trimester screening programme for foetal abnormalities, such as Down syndrome”.

Down syndrome babies are commonly aborted these days. Irish couples travel to England for this purpose. Does Fergal Malone want the Rotunda to be able to abort Down syndrome babies as well? Down syndrome babies are not suffering from a ‘lethal abnormality’ so we can see the slippery slope at work once again.

Unfortunately, we don’t know Professor Malone’s position on this because Ryan did not ask about it.

Thus we see how the Irish public are being softened up ahead of a referendum to repeal Article 40.3.3. The undoubtedly hard cases of ‘fatal foetal abnormality’ are being put in front of them to this end. Counter-arguments are barely heard. The ‘slippery slope’ argument is dismissed as such much ‘scare-mongering’ even though the evidence that the slippery slope is real, is directly in front of us.