To believe that Britain promotes eugenics.

[WriterofDreams]

I am aware this is going to be highly controversial and could upset some people but it's an issue that genuinely concerns me and I'm not just shit-stirring. I do expect to get flamed, but any reasonable argument or debate is very welcome.

I come from Ireland where abortion is illegal. I am fully aware that many Irish women go abroad for abortions so I'm not saying look how great we are we don't abort. However, until I moved to the UK I never heard of the practice of people testing their baby for anomalies and then aborting them if there was something wrong. It genuinely shocked me that a couple who tried to have a baby, went through the sometimes stressful process of ttc, got the longed-for bfp and then lived with the expectation of a baby for many weeks could then go and kill that baby because it had Down Syndrome or some other (non-lifethreatening) genetic condition. I have looked it up on a number of sites and extreme though it may appear I can't get past the feeling that this basically hidden eugenics.

What do you think?

I do sort of see what you are saying, abortion doesn't sit well with me. But i believe it has a place in society. I agree from a personal level in that i personally would not abort for "hair lip" or downs (hence why i didnt bother with the abnormality blood tests. But there are other things i would possibly consider it for.

Its a very personal subject, and everyone will have their own take on it.

I've never bought into the media hype about "cleft palate abortions". Cleft palate is often part of extremely serious disabilities. So, I've always thought that it was a bit Daily Mailish to scream late abortions for cleft palate.

Altinkum - 2shoes was making a point by her comment about abortion up to birth. She doesn't actually believe that it should be available.

Writerofdreams - I think Altinkum meant to say "why you are putting eugenics in the same sentence as disability", not distance!

Writerofdreams, what disgusts me is that Ireladn has no abortion and yet no facility for children who are born with the various sn. It's POT LUCK whether your autistic child gets the right help earlier enough. So it's don't abort no matter what, but then, if you're child isn't normal you're on your own. good luck.

The cleftpalate/clubfeet abortions certainly took place and despite more than one court case around this issue, there has never been any suggestion that the small number of cases cited involved other conditions. My understanding is that these were the cases that were "left over" after all the other cases checked proved to have justifiable reasons.

Were you aware that the high profile case in Italy of the baby who survived a 24 week abortion for a couple of days, was terminated due to cleft palate and lip?

Highly emotive subject, and one very close to my heart. I haven't read through the thread in detail, this is just my story and what I feel, in response to the OPs question.

We terminated a pregnancy at 18 weeks due to our baby having Down's Syndrome. To be honest, I am pleased to have had the choice. Our baby had cardiac problems that were incompatible with life. Without question he would have died before, during, or shortly after birth. There is no way he could have survived. People who think that Down's Syndrome "isn't really that bad, it's only a learning disability", often know no more about it than the people with Down's Syndrome they see or meet in the street.

Our baby died 2.5 years ago and even now people in RL who should know better tell me that I should have taken the pregnancy to term, that I was wrong to have had a termination, that human life is sacrosanct.

People don't 'just get rid' of babies without much thought. You don't wake up one morning and decide that because your baby has a disability you are going to end the pregnancy. We researched, talked, discussed with the consultant, looked at the test results (the ones that showed the appalling problem with our baby's heart), discussed some more and finally decided what we needed to do. The process took almost 2 weeks.

I have lost count of the number of times it has been implied that we took the easy way out. That we didn't want the responsibility of caring for our baby. Well, it doesn't bloody well feel like the easy option...there's not a day that I don't wish things could have been different.

So, no, I don't think Britain is practising eugenics - nor are the people in charge promoting it. Sometimes you just have to know when to let go.

And for the record, as far as I am aware, it is legal for a termination for medical reasons to take place at any time before the baby's due date (I might be wrong, but this is my understanding).

This is absolutely and completely distinct from abortion because the baby isn't wanted.

"But how many late stage terminations occur post 24 weeks of foetuses which aren't suffering from life threatening conditions? Are there any figures?"

I linked to some stats earlier. Something like 124 terminations were done past 24 weeks in 2008.

Also I think only 1% of all terminations done in this country were under provision E which states:

there is a substantial risk that if
the child were born it would suffer
from such physical or mental
abnormalities as to be seriously
handicapped (section 1(1)(d))

Exactly Panda, that baby in Italy had a much more serious condition, it wasn't "just" the cleft palate. The case had been hyped by the anti abortionist party at that time.

Funny thing is, that the Italian anti abortionist party is an ally of Berlusconi's party, that is deffo not investing any money in helping families who care for children/adults with disabilities.

Ah I see what you mean now Altinkum. Eugenics is the practice of deciding who can have children and who will be born in order "improve" the genetic composition of the species. So if you abort a child for having a genetic disability you are essentially removing that child from the gene pool. My view that it is hidden eugenics stems from the fact that it is sold as a service for the parents but it has a hidden eugenic side effect.

Quietlysuggests I am really really shocked at what happened to your friend. So the state was basically sending a paid civil servant to advocate for abortion? Maybe the eugenics element isn't as hidden as I thought.

Also colditz I worked in Ireland in fully funded 1-to-1 tuition for children with autism and also in a fully funded facility for children with other disabilities. I don't know where you got the idea that there is no provision for children with disabilities in Ireland. Both of the facilities I worked in in Ireland were world-class.

sorry to hear of your experience Ishtar2410

Trying to explain altinkum's point (and hoping I have got it right)

Killing people/aborting foetuses on the basis of genes that can be passed on = eugenics, because it will change the genetic makeup of the population if carried out on a large scale.

Doing so on the basis of mutations/trisomies/abnormalities that are not passed on is not eugeneics, because it only affects that individual.

If we kill everyone with red hair, there will be fewer redheads in the next generation = eugenics.

If we kill everyone who likes rap music, that doesn't stop people in the next generation from liking rap (although they may try to hide it).

'This is absolutely and completely distinct from abortion because the baby isn't wanted.'

ishtar I completely agree with you. I'm so sorry for what you went through. I felt a need to respond to your post because we went through the exact same thing in February this year, albeit at 14 weeks.

It was the complications associated with the Down Syndrome that meant our baby boy would have been lucky to survive another week of pregnancy let alone make it to term. There had not been a baby in medical history that had survived beyond birth with the complications our baby was suffering.

quietlysuggests, Oh my god! that is terrible! your poor friends, they should not need to justify themselves to anyone!

altinkum, aborting a child because it is disabled is a form of eugenics.

Ishtar, that is so sad. I had no idea Downs could cause such serious defects.

Trillian, eugenics predates people understanding which conditions are heritable and which aren't. So I think the situation is unclear.

Ishtar thank you for sharing your story. I'm so sorry you had to go through that it sounds horrible.

Your little baby didn't have any hope of surviving. In that case I think you absolutely did the right thing, as going through with the pregnancy couldn't possibly have led to a good outcome. In my original post I stated that I was talking about non-lifethreatening conditions. People who tell you you did the wrong thing are heartless monsters. I would never expect a woman in your position to go to term.

The only thing that really doesn't sit well with me, is if a baby is found to be disabled or have abnormalities, they can be aborted up to 40 weeks.

Redflag I didn't know about that till this thread. I wouldn't have thought it was possible to be honest that a HCP would really kill a moving baby.

Growing up in Ireland in the 1980s/1990s, abortion was a hugely contentious issue - the country was so imbued in Catholicism that about 98% of all secondary schools were run by religious orders and it was completely the norm for teenage girls to be shown videos of and about abortions. When I was in college, our student's union was brought to court for publishing the phone number of advisory services that might give the phone numbers of abortion clinics in the UK. Copies of British magazines had their back pages blacked out if they contained phone numbers of abortion clinics. It all sort of came to a head with the 'x case' when it was discovered that a 14 year old girl who had been raped by a family friend had travelled to the UK for an abortion, and she was brought back to Ireland by the Irish police. Within that atmosphere, abortion was presented as inherently evil, and akin to murder no matter at what stage the abortion happened.
While I marched for 'a woman's right to choose' as a student in Dublin when I was pg with my first dc (in the UK) and had the standard nuchal fold test, I felt almost repulsed that I was then asked if I wanted an amnio as I was highish risk and the implication was I would consider termination...
However, as I discovered on dc2, in Ireland if you go through the public health service the nuchal fold test is never offered as standard, you have to pay for it privately - according to the sonographer who performed my 12-week scan this was due to the 'moral implications.' I found this really irritating...

Sorry for the long post but I suppose I'm just trying to say that Ireland and the UK have very different histories in relation to abortion and it can be unsettling if you have grown up in a strongly anti-abortion culture to see how acceptable it is in the UK.

The morality/ethics of all this does not seem very clear cut, and especially if one considers how poorly treated many living children were in Ireland in the past then the obsession with the unborn seems a bit strange. DS children are more visible and almost celebrated in Ireland. Eugenics seem to have come out of an obsession with racial hygiene and I don't think it is the right term to apply here.