Doctors back ‘easier’ abortions
Current Affairs, Medical June 27th, 2007“Doctors have called for a relaxation of the rules to allow women quicker access to abortions in early pregnancy.
The British Medical Association conference backed a motion calling for abortions to be approved by just one doctor, rather than the current two.”
BBC
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/6242382.stm
June 27th, 2007 at 8:33 pm
A personal opinion is that this is a negative proposal from a section of the medical profession.
The original abortion law was that abortion should be provided on grounds of medical and psychological care. Two doctors were required to approve the procedure and to confirm that the patient understood the nature of the procedure being undertaken and that they required the abortion for the correct reasons.
Incidentally the ‘psychological’ reasons were sufficiently open ended and undefined and went beyond the obvious ‘the mother is unbalanced and may kill her child or herself if the pregnancy were to proceed’.
What was intended from the law was two specific things
i) abortion procedures should no longer take place outside of the remit of the health care providers,
ii) abortion should not be performed on demand.
Due to the lack of definition of ‘psychological factors’ the law underwent a series of procedural deteriorations where despite good legislative intentions practitioners have been able to undermine the law or to push the boundaries of its definition.
Incidentally this week it was revealed that terminations were at an all time high last year and that medical opinion was dissappointed with this.
“The Royal College of Obstetricians said the rise was “disappointing” and showed a failure to deal with the problem of unplanned pregnancies.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/6765953.stm
If then abortion is being used as a method of contraception, as it would appear to be. Is it not counter-productive to reduce the medical pbstacles currently in place?
(This argument is not relevant where there are genuine medical grounds for an abortion).