To expect a midwife to carry out termination duties?

[foglike]

To think a midwife has to carry out these duties and not claim religious discrimination because she's catholic?

bbc link

At the hospital I was at they don't start medical intervention until 23 weeks, the lungs arnt well developed enough for the baby to live before that

Do they provide palliative care though? Pain relief?

Palliative care wasn't mentioned to us, we were just told that he might show signs of life and that we could stay with him if we wanted to, if not a mw would, I'd think it would be very difficult to find veins in such a tiny baby for them to give pain relief but I'm not sure, pain was one thing that worried me and they did say something about not being developed enough to feel pain but I'm not sure

The thing is that what Badday did was very difficult, and I have no doubt she is haunted by it, and not to minimize what she did at all, I'm sure we would all hope that we have enough humanity and strength inside us to be able to do it too.

I also think the parents are probably haunted. They had already made the difficult decision to have an abortion, and then this happened.

What if they had been met by a mw who thoroughly disapproved of other people having abortions. Would that mw have refused to take that baby away or to have 'delegated' another mw to do so. No doubt, someone could make a case for making those parents face the consequences of their decision, that the baby should have been left in the room with them. That if anyone were to hold that baby, it should be the parents.

What if a more humane mw took the baby away like Badday did. What if that supervising mw refused to support her after that traumatic experience?

It starts looking like that awful Dickensian judgmental attitude prevalent among those who set themselves up to 'help' the poor and needy, while taking a great deal of pleasure out of judging them as less than they themselves are. Because they're poor, or because they have abortions.

Thats has been precisely my point throughout this thread Jux.

I totally agree they shouldn't

I suppose my situation was abit different in that we had decided to carryon with the pregnancy and it was only when his legs came through my cervix and he got stuck that we agreed to take the pills to open the cervix up, before that point it would have been classed as a late mc

However i was terrified, terrified that he might be born alive but wouldn't live, terrified of seeing him, terrified of having to say good bye

I can't imagen how much worse it would have been if the mw hadn't agreed with my decision to take the tablets, what if shed made her feelings obvious, I had a fantastic mw and student mw.

The student mw took pictures and footprints, put a little hat on him and told us how beautiful he was, so much better than having someone who didn't want to be there

bumbley, you asked about supervision. It actually has a particular meaning in midwifery: all midwives have to have a Supervisor of Midwives, to whom they can turn for professional advice and support. I imagine that in this case, when they talk about supervision they mean acting as a supervisor of midwives, rather than being in the room watching the midwife at work.

You also asked about babies born alive. Most of my abortion experience is within non-NHS clinics, which are governed very tightly by Department of Health rules that don't always apply in the same way within the NHS. Certainly, our procedures usually ensured that babies weren't born alive. In some rare cases babies are born showing signs of life, but that doesn't necessarily mean they are capable of life (I imagine the sad case Jux talks about is one of those). Certainly, non-NHS clinics are under very strict rules that if a baby is born alive all clinically appropriate efforts must be made to keep them alive. No late abortion was undertaken without an incubator kept nearby and ready warmed. (I don't know of any cases when it was actually used.)

I should add that I worked with some really great people in the abortion sector, thoughtful and compassionate and motivated by great concern for the women we cared for. There were doctors who had sacrificed potentially great medical careers in order to work in this low status area. There were nurses and midwives who wouldn't tell any of their friends and neighbours where they worked, but nonetheless turned up every day and did their best for the girls and women who needed them. All of them disliked undertaking late abortion, too - NOBODY likes it - but they believed that women are not free without reproductive freedom, that safe legal abortion is an intrinsic part of that, and that somebody has to roll their sleeves up in order to turn that principle into reality.

Great posts from Jux and Renee.

Renee, I'd be appalled if they mean they will refuse to act as supervisor of midwives for any midwives who assist at abortions. Good grief. If that is the case, are they effectively trying to shut down abortion services while they are at work?

I imagine if they are now in supervisory capacities, then if they won't delegate, won't supervise and won't support the mws under them, then the service would be pretty hard to keep going. We can be thankful that one of them has chosen the coward's way out and got herself signed off. (OK, that was unnecessary bitchiness, but I'm not sure I care).

"Actually fog, a lot of the emotive language came from Rational herself during the thread and tbh I'm not sure that the majority of posters agree with her idea that people should not become HCPs unless they are prepared to carry out abortions - most people seemed to understand and respect the need for the 'opt out' even if they think the midwives are taking it a bit far in this particular case. As far as the strange way of thinking goes...someone who refers to not being able to 'win' after someone posts their real life experience has a very strange outlook on the whole thing imo."

I stand by what I said or I wouldn't have said it, I wasn't emotive, I in fact didn't even bring my own experience into it in a personal way until the 'crazy bint' Charleneblah started calling me a murderer. That's just too much. My point as far as the midwives in question was, if you feel that strongly that you can't even direct other staff to care then you are being hypocritical by taking a wage from the organisation that will take care of these women. I don't think women like that should have anything to do with women who are going through one of the hardest decisions they ever have to make.

The emotive stories will pull at anyone's heart strings, who doesn't feel for the women who abort because of rape, or the women who find that the foetus is awfully deformed? I also feel for the women who were just caught out, who know they don't want a child, can't provide for it and just made a terrible mistake. And please, remember that late abortions, where there is a possibility that the foetus is born alive (the statistics of which I will investigate) is a tiny fraction of the total number of abortions performed. Can we please stop being so emotive around 'babies' and start thinking about the women?

My thinking is strange? Really?

Rational, Re. certain things, yes it is. Perhaps the way you express it has something to do with it.

RV, thanks for your reply. You said " I imagine that in this case..." so you don't actually know for certain that the 'supervision' duties that they are objecting to definitely don't involve attending the abortion. I think that unless we know that for certain then it's difficult to determine whether 'supervision' can be classed as direct or indirect involvement.

just reread this thread. rational, rv, jux - you've done a wonderful job representing the voice of reason. well done for persevering.

thank goodness that, for the main part, religious beliefs don't provide an opt out here for hcps. i pity the poor women of afganistan and saudi who die needlessly because 'religious beliefs' mean that they cannot be treated by a male doctor. let's only hope that one day the termination loophole is closed too.

Scroobious, did you not notice when you were retreading that it is not necessarily religious beliefs that people opt out on?

but the op was about catholic midwives. as for retreading, well, there's been plenty of that on both sides to be fair.

Yes, but the thread has discussed the whole 'opt-out' in general. Do y think they should only be allowed to opt out if it isn't or religious reasons?

It should have said re-reading. Fast typing! I'm not sure what you think I meant by retreading...

If it isnt FOR religious reasons.

personally i don't distinguish between religious and any other ethical or personal beliefs. i think the law is heading that way too. so, as you have asked the question, no, i don't think there should be an opt out for any form of belief. i think rv, rational and others have adequately stated the reasons for this.

for me, in part this argument comes down to the rule of law. the uk is a democracy. those who disagree with abortions are free to campaign for a law change on this subject or to seek to be elected as MPs. however, once parliament has voted on a particular law, we (including hcps) must all observe it until parliament repeals it. certain groups of people cannot be above the law. that way lies corruption, anarchy and a failed state.

re-reading, ah thank you - i thought you were accusing me of retreading old ground, ie reraising a previously raised argument.

PS. apologise for the lack of capitals - my shift key has broken so capitalising is a particularly complicated process.

It might not be for religious reasons, some people don't dig murder.

well, it might kill the woman if she doesn't have an abortion... how is that then, morally.

"It might not be for religious reasons, some people don't dig murder."

How fucking tiresome, another arse who wants to call me a murderer. Tell you what, you call the police and I'll await the fucking charges. Bring it on!

Don't worry about it Rational. It's not their fault they don't understand Scroobius post, or the nature of a democracy.

There's going to be a bit of a lurch as some people do the jumping up and down in ire thing when the adverts start!

I know, I'm almost looking forward to it. I did laugh when it was said on the news that the ads mustn't be 'offensive'. What they actually mean is don't offend all those deluded masses by showing pictures of dead 'babies', that's not nice.

There will also be those who'll say that it's going to encourage women to abort, like they'll be quite happily going along with a pregnancy, see the ad and think "Fuck, that's a good idea!". We'll see, it'll be interesting to see the backlash.

Oh yeah, because we're all so easily led aren't we (well, we're only women aren't we, and immoral ones at that).

When I saw the headlines this morning, my day brightened a little. Maybe dd's world will be a little bit better, after all.

bumbley, I am of course holding back from making definitive statements about this case, because nobody posting on this thread - including me - know for sure what the facts of the case are.

However, we know the crux of the issue, which is that these midwives are arguing that the definition of conscientious objection should be widened to cover indirect involvement. If they win that argument, a national NHS abortion service will gradually become untenable. There is lots of information in this thread that demonstrates how this will happen.

I am just restating this for the benefit of anyone who joins this thread late and imagines this is about midwives protesting against being forced to murder babies. It isn't.

Dim question - what headlines Jux?

Also RV thanks so much for your posts, it is really good to know people like you are involved in maternity services.