To think that the world would not be a better place without Heidi *Content Warning - abortion/disability edited by MNHQ*

[bridgetreilly]

Heidi is 24 and has Downs syndrome. She is beautiful and brilliant and very articulate in explaining why the UK abortion law is discriminatory in allowing abortion up to full term where the child has Downs syndrome (and other non-fatal disabilities including cleft palate or club foot), when the standard limit is 24 weeks.

She's not the only one to think that. The United Nations’ Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities’ concluding observations on the initial report of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland made a key recommendation that the UK change its abortion law on disability so that it does not single out babies with disabilities. However, the Government has decided to ignore this recommendation.

Heidi, along with the mother of a young boy with Downs syndrome, is planning to sue the government for discrimination. She is amazing and I hope she wins.

Because currently a foetus/baby is effectively given a right to life at 24 weeks. If that foetus/baby has DS, they do not get the same. It’s not about taking rights away from women. It’s about giving foetuses/babies with DS the same recognition that non-DS foetuses babies get.

Because currently a foetus/baby is effectively given a right to life at 24 weeks. If that foetus/baby has DS, they do not get the same. It’s not about taking rights away from women. It’s about giving foetuses/babies with DS the same recognition that non-DS foetuses babies get.

It's not about DS, it's about a foetus with disabilities. It is also about serious maternal health issues such as grave physical or mental injury or danger to her life which are the other reason a pregnancy can be terminated post-24 weeks.

Foetus' with Down Syndrome get the same abortion law applied to them as all pregnancies and the law states that the pregnancy can be ended post-24wks in these circumstances.

The post-24wk allowance is to accommodate the time it takes to obtain testing and results, time for a decision to be reached, time for a second opinion, time to monitor the situation to see if there is deterioration, etc.

Removing these rights absolutely is about taking rights away from women.

Heidi's mother had a choice in her pregnancy, she chose to continue, it is unbelievable that she now wants to take that choice away from other women.

Oh come on with your disabled rights. All you care about is restricting the Women’s right to control what happens to her and her body. The ‘rights’ thing is just a smoke screen.

If you care so much, offer to support a disabled person and provide care for the rest of their life. Let’s see you bear the emotional and financial burden.

It isn’t ‘beyond rare’ for 24 weekers to live. It’s around 60%. That goes up to around 89% by 27 weeks and over 90% by 31 weeks. I know I live in a prem baby bubble due to accessing support groups, but I know several 24 weekers.

I also never said 24 weekers would ‘just need an ng tube and warmth’ I said I’d seen 24 weekers do well and that affected me personally when it came to the 24 week limit. I am entitled to that viewpoint for those reasons. I don’t expect everyone to share it.

I also said I’d never been in that situation so it wasn’t for me to judge.

If a baby is born at 38 weeks, and their only issue is Down’s syndrome. How can you call it an abortion? I find it hard to believe that a baby of 38 weeks gestation, with Down’s syndrome, would be withheld care because the parent decides they want to ‘abort’ surely lots of other factors would be at play.

In the circumstance the baby is induced at 38 weeks, and subsequently dies due to major complications, I honestly don’t see how that is an abortion.

You can’t ‘abort’ a baby at full term can you? Surely a baby that dies at full term is a baby that has died at full term.

If you care about the rights of disabled people and families receiving appropriate support then:

• campaign for the restoration of Sure Start Centres
• campaign for an increase in Carers' Allowance from the current £66.15 p/UK
• campaign for the abolishment of PIP and a restoration of DLA for all
• campaign for an end to inhumane assessments and re-applications in order to continue claiming PIP/DLA
• donate what you can, time as well as money, to charities that support disabled people and their families
• be more inclusive of people with disabilities and their families
• campaign for proper funding for schools including ringfenced funding for pupils with SN and SEN
• campaign for proper funding for the NHS
• campaign for proper funding for social care services

Know what doesn't help disabled people and their families? Meddling around with the contents of other womens uteri.

What about the equality laws that exist to say discrimination is fundamentally wrong?
Time and time again people with a disability are being treated as second class citizens and laws that should protect them are ignored and broken
24 weeks to decide on a termination is 6 months Surely that’s long enough ?
There are so many examples of people with Down syndrome working , living independently, getting married DESPITE the obstacles being put in their way

In reality there’s no evidence that any woman has ever had an abortion at 38 weeks due to DS and I cannot imagine that it would ever happen.

This.

So why all the focus on it?

YABU

A woman's body, and her decisions around her healthcare are hers alone. I am entirely opposed to any criminalisation of women for making their own reproductive decisions, and do not believe it is society's place to probe or assess her reasons for terminating HER pregnancy in her body.

The wrong in this situation is not that she isn't criminalised for terminating a pregnancy for medical reasons.
The wrong is that she is criminalised for terminating any other 'healthy' pregnancy.

You want to fix the disparity? Don't argue that women should be punished more. Argue that they should never be punished in the first place.

No foetus should be assigned any legal right to a woman's body, let alone one that outranks the right of the woman who is using her body to create it.

Canada has a lot to criticise currently, but they have one principle I admire when it comes to women's autonomy over their own bodies: as early as possible, as late as necessary.

The use of disabled people to lobby for the removal of women's rights is distasteful in the extreme.

We already criminalise women for terminating their own pregnancies, in their own bodies, which is inhumane.

Lobbying to be able to make more criminals of more pregnant women by legislating their reproductive rights even further is about as un-heartwarming as it gets.

So, I very much hope Heidi fails. It's her reproductive rights I support just as much as any other woman's.

My body, my choice, from the day of my birth to the day of my death.

Discrimination laws don't apply to the unborn as they do not have personhood. All rights rest with the owner of the body carrying the foetus.

24 weeks to decide on a termination is 6 months Surely that’s long enough ?

Some issues cannot be picked up until the 20 week scan which is carried out at any point between 18wks and 22wks. Appointments then need to be arranged for further tests followed by the wait for results. There then needs to be time allowed for the woman to make a decision about how to proceed, this should include time for her to process the information she has been given. If she doesn't have all of the details she needs until 24wks, should she have to decide there and then? Or should she be given some time?

@LaurieMarlow the mum in the news article knew of a mum who had been offered an abortion at 38 weeks.

The mum also felt that HCPs were unnecessarily and negatively biased when giving the news to parents.

It isn’t ‘beyond rare’ for 24 weekers to live. It’s around 60%.

You said 24 weekers do very well. I said that was rare. Living is not the same as doing very well.

Also it’s amazing how many people here are so up in arms about the rights of disabled foetuses and yet show no concern about disabled children and adults or their carers.

So why all the focus on it?

Because it makes for a shocking headline to aid the cause of the anti-choice brigade. They can focus on "abortion allowed up until term" to make it seem like hoardes of women are lining up to end perfectly healthy pregnancies for no reason other than a passing whim. They use the idea of an apple-cheeked newborn in peril from its heartless and cruel 'mother' to try and provoke people into agreeing that it should not be allowed.

The reality is that women who are having abortions after the 24wk mark are overwhelmingly doing so at a point closer to 24wks than 38wks and they are doing so in heartbreaking and/or difficult circumstances. They are making the decision they believe to be best and no one has the right to tell them they are wrong.

Shouldn’t women’s rights also include the rights of a woman with Down syndrome ?
As a woman whose right to even exist is being questioned time and time again . I would have thought she has a right to be heard too?

Abortion is appropriate at any time, for any reason. My body is my own.

Shouldn’t women’s rights also include the rights of a woman with Down syndrome ? As a woman whose right to even exist is being questioned time and time again . I would have thought she has a right to be heard too?

She has a right to be heard. She has the right to an abortion if she wants one, same as other women. She has the right to not have an abortion if she does not want one, same as other women. She does not have a right to take away the choices and rights of other women.

Her rights do not come at the expense of mine.

@Beebie2 the medical professions who offer this are aware of what happens to lots of people with disabilities especially severe ones. It is better you spend your time campaigning for the things as @Hoik stated in her post than chastising medical professionals for being realistic to the situation now.

What about the equality laws that exist to say discrimination is fundamentally wrong?
Time and time again people with a disability are being treated as second class citizens and laws that should protect them are ignored and broken
24 weeks to decide on a termination is 6 months Surely that’s long enough?

You’ve literally argued against your own point. It is long enough for most women, yes.

For women who find out that their baby has a severe disability at the 20 week scan, 4 weeks is not enough time to have further tests, get results and then decide what to do. Hence the different laws. This is not discrimination. This is the result of various severe abnormalities only becoming evident at 20 weeks and later.

Actually if this was truly about not discriminating, then they would be campaigning for the time limit to be either 24 weeks for all foetuses or term for all foetuses. The key being “for all”.

Either solution removes the discrimination.

The fact they are campaigning for the removal of late term abortions for disabilities, rather than for allowing late term abortions for all, says to me that this is anti abortion rather than anti discrimination.

As a woman whose right to even exist is being questioned time and time again

The availability of late stage abortion does not question her right to exist any more than the availability of early stage abortion questions your right to exist, or mine.

I genuinely cannot comprehend the mentality of people who believe that viable babies (without medical issues) should be allowed to be terminated until the moment of birth

I agree with this. Even if you change the word baby to fetus. Most of us have probably seen a 38 week baby not long after birth. Fetus/baby we know what we're talking about here.

I find it shocking that many women on this thread would support the right of any women of any baby in any circumstance to abort a healthy 38 week fetus/baby (which would mean kill, we know that really.)

Yes it would very very rarely happen with a healthy baby, but when it did, and it would very occasionally, it would be grotesque. That's why we have a law for something even though it would hardy ever happen.
The reality of what would be involved to 'abort' a 38 week 'fetus' with no medical issues should be looked squarely at.

When I see this kind of extreme position espoused, it seems to me that right to choose has become an ideology, where any nuance or conflict of that cannot be tolerated, and you can see that on here with the anger towards those who do not subscribe wholesale to the ideology, or who use language not subscribed.

I agree with Xenia. the laws currently reflect most people's views:
That women should get to choose until a baby is viable, then there are other ethical factors to consider not just women's rights and currently 24 weeks seems an arbitrary but broadly agreed cut off for this.
Most people agree that later than this for severely disabled babies might be necessary.
So we do have discrimination, which is hard for people with disabilities to see.

You can all come on and shout the standard ideological soundbites at me now and pretend there are no other issues or conflicts at all if you want.
But abortion is hard to discuss precisely because there are deep ethical issues both ways, and they conflict.
I find anyone who takes an extreme view end to be ideological, angry and very self righteous.
I guess such moral certitude would lead to self righteousness.

Beebie no, women do not abort full term babies, healthy or not, and just let them die.

The guidelines from the Royal College of Obs and Gyne are pretty clear - if a pregnancy is 21 weeks gestation or more and the mother wants to terminate, steps are taken to ensure that the fetus isn't born alive.

If a fetus of whatever gestation is born alive, they have the same rights to care and the same legal rights as any other child. When they are born, their legal status changes to that of a child.

So, no, abortion is not performed by birthing live babies and then withholding care.

Pumpkinpie the woman with DS has the same rights as any other woman. Why she wants to remove her rights to abort a severely disabled foetus is beyond me.

What if her pregnancy was putting too much strain on her heart. Who's rights should come first??

Abortion at full term? I'd never heard of that - how awful. .it should be the same limit for abled and disabled babies. That isn't forcing women to continue pregnancies they can't support, they still have the option to abort before 24 weeks.

Surely it can't be justified past the point of viability for DS? Especially as DS is screened for at 12 weeks. So you'd have another 12 to decide.

baby thank you.
I agree with every word. And you put it so much more succinctly and tactfully then me.

I agree that a late stage abortion because the baby has a disability is an awful thing and we should try and reduce the numbers of people doing it if we can. However I think the way to do that is to try and improve the timing of tests and appointments so that mothers find out about disabilities and have them confirmed sooner. Also the way disabled people and their families are supported needs to improve a lot.