sterlizing drug addicts

[DwainRooney]

Should people who cannot look after their childen be sterilized?

The cutbacks are affecting everyone and why should we throw money at people who will eventually have their children put into care at great expense to the taxpayers

If you cannot look after your children you should not have them

thesecondcoming glad to see we are on the same boat here!! Let's start recruiting new members for the BNP ....

I'm sure the last time this was in the news it was described as a bit more complicated than it is being made to sound on here. There was some figure of each of the sterilised women having an average of 7 children already and feeling destroyed by the constant guilt and pain of what they did to the kids and losing them. There was also the option of three yearly smaller payments to have the contraceptive implant put in (this is a better way to go about it, I think).

The idea that we are choosing who has kids by this is a bit sensationalist (7 is a lot by anyone's standards). The constant cycle of fall pregnant - damage baby - give baby up - try to replace sad feeling with another baby.... is not an enviable position nor one our most vulnerable members of society should be dealing with on their own. To equate the happy straightforward, loving feelings you have had in having a baby to these circumstances is misplaced, throw in a shedload of guilt and a head muddled with drugs and you are halfway there.

Offering sterilisation is one thing, paying an addict cold hard cash to their fertility is another. Offer it, for free, and those who do not want more children can take you up on it. Offering an addict money is immoral.

One of the problems with the idea of choosing who should be allowed to produce children is who should be in control of the process - the Government? Would you really want your fertility monitored by the ideology of the day? So today its only addicts who don't get to have children. How long before the nanny state thinks it would be a good idea to stop anyone having a third child? FFS, you can't even trust government to organise Child Benefit properly, let alone fertility! One can only hope the BNP never gets into any position of power. Nick Griffin controlling fertility?

thesecondcoming Yes actually I could cope with some kind of temporary/reversible sterilisation, that would make a lot of sense, if indeed there is such a thing!!
From my own (purely selfish) point of view it would be a good thing, because if she fell pregnant again guess what I would do.......................................?

it truly worries me some of the views expresed on here. what happens when the gov dousnt agree with one of your life choices? not drugs but something else and they decide you shouldnt be allowed children?

how do you diferentiate between drug use and addiction? is it to sniff coke on friday night but not on mondays?

if you argue that no drug use is ok the no one who has a glass of wine in the eve should be allowed children either.

dangerous slippery slope and completly wrong

These thread's always tend to upset me really.

I am an Ex-Addict myself, I have currently been clean of heroin and any narcotic for 5 years.

At my lowest point I would of sold my fertility (or anything else for that matter..) for £20 let alone £200.

Now however, since becoming clean i have turned my life around, i have a beautiful fiancee who i love more than anything, got all my a-levels and am currently doing an OU course in computer aided design.

I think had I become clean AFTER selling my fertility it would of ruined me, I am looking forward to nothing more than having children of my own and making sure my mistakes aren't repeated, it was part of what got me through my addiction.

So essentially, I think it's wrong.

Sterility as a default? So the NHS gets to choose who gets to breed? Really? So a doctor on a high wage gets to decide if my income is suitable for the raising of children? Why not hand the decision to the family Courts, with their track record of making good decisions? Why not sterilise those who produce children with genetic disorders? After all, those children are a drain on the state, and may not have a high quality of life.

In this solution every woman has compulsory hormonal contraceptives until the state dictates otherwise? Contraceptives that can have serious side effects? Including, for some women, mental health problems.

NerdyFace, well done for turning your life aound. There should be more stories like yours being told, to help people understand what implication it has on the society as well as on the individual.

This whole idea of paying to get sterilised is just wrong. It is taking advantage of a desperate situation...

People need support, and that means time and money- taking a shortcut is like buing cheap merchandise that breaks before you even leave the shop.

The scheme is not for people like you at all nerdyface. I wish people would actually read the charitys statistics and target group before these tangent arguments which take away from the point. Multiple pregnancies. Already had many kids taken away sick still born miscarriages. A long term solution for these women could be a positive step for them. This would never ever be something under the control of the government. It is not about that at all. Please read their info.

NerdyFace Well done you. It gives me hope.

Yes well done nerdy face. You are in a real minority. It takes enormous strength. My mum has got clean but she is now 58 , it took 44 years!

It's all down to my Partner really..I was doing my best to get clean when I met her and it was taking a lot out of me, wanting to be better for her really drove me to get clean!

I owe her my life essentially! (Something she never lets me forget when some god awful romance film comes into the cinema! )

'But what about if your mum was the alcoholic and having her tenth child that would again be damaged and have to go through guilt and separation pain etc. To go and get pregnant again . Thats where this is aimed'

It isn;t where it is aimed; the person on the news was a male.

sonia77...i agree with you.It is interesting to hear from a person who has grown up with this.I am sorry you have had such a crap time.I look at the babies I work with and wonder what the heck is going to happen to them.
I think very few exceptions[as in people turn their lives around]
I do know of an alcoholic who screwed up his first marriage and 3 children then sorted himself out and married again and has 2 children...shame for the first 3 children though.

Does anyone on here think an addict would be unfairly tempted by money, so could not possibly enter into a "contract" such as this?

scarymoaning, actually the vast majority of the scheme is for women having multiple pregnancies. yes there are men too. but they are not the ones damaging an unborn feotus are they and going into labour high on crack. this is aimed at long term addicts who have already probably been in prison, rehab, had all the money thrown at them. they desperately need help to prevent this happening over and over again.

Absolutely, Theincrediblesulk1 - that is why I have a problem with this. As NerdyFace says, he would have sold his fertility for £20, never mind £200, at his lowest point.

Someone who is addicted probably does not have the mental competance to agree to such a final decision.

I would, however, agree with paying addicts to have a long-term, but reversible form of contraception, such as the coil. That leaves the door open for them to have children in the future, when and if they get clean.

But surely what cpunts is what they do- and the person they chose to start with and publicise was male.

There are long term reversible contraceptives available for females, this the end objective is achievable without permanently damaging the life chances of those who manage to turn things around. It's not either sterilise or be over run with chidlren born addicted; there is a middle road.

Or if the charity HAS to sterilise (to which I will always be opposed) they shouldn't offer cash: not OK.

Evry generation of my family up until mine has had an alcoholic parent: dad started work at 5 to eat, becuase Grandad drank the wages and Nan never left her bed for forty years. Back a generation Great Nan was pawning their winter coats for a botle of cider. Yet Dad broke that cycle and got himself sorted and did well in life, which shows IMO that whatever the odds you can have a chance.

SDTG- exactly.

It's not attacking the problem of addiction, which is my main problem with it.

We need more dedicated care and preventative measures.

I don't even want to think about some of the things I had to do to get my next hit!

Why pay someone to be sterile and continue to have an addiction untill they probably die?

WHY NOT, pay that £200 to put someone into rehab? Or something like that?..surely that would be a better use of the money?

Once you ruin a child's life through your own addiction I think you lose the right to procreate, not indefinitely but until you can prove you are clean.

there is no cure for addiction, i dont know what the average times for entering rehab is or the recovery rate, but it is pretty miniscule. like i said before, they have already been down that route. and its not worked. and they have probably come out and got pregnant again!! and they DO support continuing rehab programms along side, maybe this is the catalys for breaking the cycle of feeling so terrible and guilty about what they are doing to their children , this has been quoted as being the first positive step they have taken in their lives .

this is not for a one time 19 year old cannabis user who has not had any children, that could not be further from its aim.

they are talking hardcore heroin and drug addicts whose lifestyle is not fit for dogs let alone babies.

sorry but your natural ability to have children is the default setting. i don't think every member of society should have that altered with and risk never being able to have children because there are addicts in the world.