Today's ruling re Down's Syndrome

[Shirazboobaloo]

Sorry to hijack AIBU for this but can someone explain this ruling to me please?

What I can't understand (from press reports) is how this has "come to this".

Who is Heidi Crowther and who are those supporting her?

I am genuinely confused but don't know where to ask

How do they terminate full term pregnancies?

@AlexaShutUp

They shouldn't. But rolling back abortion rights is not how to address it. What needs to happen is that abortion should be available until the last minute for all women, for any reason.

@Clymene, I get where you're coming from, but I would also struggle with the idea of making abortion available to all women until the pregnancy is full term. I am absolutely pro choice but I couldn't support that. For me, I think it comes down to the point at which the foetus has a reasonable chance of surviving independently of the mother... they then become a viable person and have rights of their own.

But the reality is, even if abortion to term were legalised, it would be phenomenally rare. Women simply don’t get to 25+ weeks of pregnancy and decide they want to terminate healthy pregnancies, whatever certain factions want to claim about women who have abortions willy nilly because they’ve decided they want to go on holiday or whatever. If they do get to that stage, they usually have significant mental health issues or very specific personal circumstances, and late term abortion already exists for them.

Thing is it’s a lot easier to think about this at the 24 weeks stage because you’re only halfway through the pregnancy, but given that a pregnancy where disability is detected can be terminated until birth how do people reconcile that?

Let’s look at it from a different perspective?

You’re pregnant with a baby who has been diagnosed with DS at around the 20 week mark. You’re not sure about termination, so you continue with the pregnancy but you do some research, and eventually decide at 38 weeks that you’re going to terminate the pregnancy, so you make the appointment. However, the night before you are due to go in you go into spontaneous labour and the baby is born at home. Given you were going to terminate this pregnancy, should it be ok to kill the baby because it was born early and before the appointment for the termination could be completed?

While terminations at 38 weeks are vanishingly rare and people will use that as a reason to dismiss the argument, the fact is, they’re legal, so anyone could decide to terminate what is a completely viable pregnancy. Not just one where assistance would be needed at birth, but a pregnancy where the baby would be born, potentially be able to latch on, bf, go home in the next couple of days.

Do people really think that is ok purely because there is a disability involved? Something as simple as say, a club foot?

It terrifies me that so many people think women should be allowed / encouraged to terminate pregnancy for any reason

We talk so much about encouraging diversity, and yet the prospect of raising a child with downs syndrome or similar is so terrible? I wish we could offer better support and respite to those families

I am not sure Heidi feeling her life is worthwhile indicates she has been manipulated. Abortion law tells her that her life and the lives of other people with DS are not important at all compared to all others - no manipulation needed to provoke some feeling.

It is absolutely shocking that a viable baby can be aborted at all!

So the mother has to give birth then what-put the baby up for adoption who are going to adopt a DS child-very few

thats the cruel thing that would come out of it

[quote Covidworries]@FuckingFlumps but currently not every woman has the right to abort up to birth? So why is that?
So i think what you are saying is the law needs ti change so that every pregnancy can be terminated up to birth ?[/quote]
Yes I would support that change in law because it would mean that many women who find out very late just before the cut off would get more time to make an informed choice rather than a rushed choice.

I know many would say that would mean many healthy babies would be aborted at near term but truthfully we all know that is utter nonsense. Its just not a valid argument.

’DS isn't singled out within the law, as the campaign would have you believe. It refers to disabilities likely to cause severe physical or mental impairment. Some consider Downs Syndrome to be a severe impairment.’

This ^

Some of you actually have no clue, do you.
I have friends who have only recently confided in me that they didn't realise I'd have to make the decision to end my pregnancy. That they didn't realise I'd have to have my baby's heart stopped with an injection. That I'd have to give birth.
If you honestly think any of that is something people do lightly...
As I've stayed, it wasn't downs syndrome but I really can't believe how quickly some people jump to mothers being monsters for making these decisions.

Same rules for all.

*stated

It is absolutely shocking that a viable baby can be aborted at all!

But look at orphanages in countries where abortion is restricted - full of unwanted disabled children. Life for many unwanted disabled children isn’t the type Heidi has, and many would argue it would have been merciful for them to have not been born in the first place.

Ground E is the abortion criteria which covers fetal abnormality. There were 229 abortions under this grounds is 2020 post 24 weeks.

Many of those will be for abnormalities not viable with life.

A feticide treatment is delivered (hence the need for an inquest where the mother abd two medical professionals are questioned by a judge to ensure there is no criminal activity similarly to that of switching off a life support)

Babdoc. My teacher friend would totally agree with you as some of her pupils with DS need to be fed via PEGs, a fair few need hearing aids and communicate by signing, some are visually impaired. Some have both hearing and sight impairments . A few have seizures and quite a few have ADHD and severe behavioural issues (biting, hitting, throwing things, running off - without the cognitive ability to learn why it’s not ok to do these things and to respond to attempts to modify these behaviours). Their lives can be very hard indeed.

’It terrifies me that so many people think women should be allowed / encouraged to terminate pregnancy for any reason’

It terrifies me that so many people think women should be forced to give birth.

It is absolutely the right decision.

As early as possible, as late as necessary. Watch out for attacks on early screening too - that was a theme a few years ago.

It was the right decision but that's not to say that underneath that there aren't huge issues with the choices facing families with children with disabilities and I agree with the discrimination aspect but I don't feel that can our weight the right of a woman to have control over her own body.

What actually needs to happen is for parents to have the reassurance that if they do have a child with disabilities that they will be well supported by the state, with proper support, respite, education, healthcare etc for their disabled child.

The out of work stats for mothers of children with disabilities are horrific. As are divorce rates for parents with children with disabilities.

That's what needs to change, not the law on terminations.

@Lalliella a fetcide is done injecting the heart in utreo with analgesia

A termination after a certain stage (21 weeks?) would involve injection of the fetal heart to ensure the baby is not born alive due to the legal and ethical implications if it was born alive.

I think very few women abort after 24 weeks and none 'at full term in the birth canal'. Almost all would be for very severe abnormalities.

I think the way to reduce abortion for DS would be to improve society and support. But some people don't just feel they cannot cope but they feel it is questionable to bring a baby into the world knowing it will have extra challenges potentially severe.

I once read a case where a woman had a baby with downs already then found out her next child also had downs. She terminated. That doesn't mean she doesn't love her child but she didn't feel she could cope with another child with special needs and thought it unfair on her existing child.

Another story that stays with me is the one where two babies were born one night. One was healthy boy and one was child with downs. The boy grew up to be Hitler and the other child was a joy to the local community.

These questions are so hard that it is best to let people decide for themselves.

@Clymene

Heidi has been manipulated by people who want to stop women from getting abortions.

Well that’s insulting. Are you not crediting Heidi with being able to hold and articulate her own views?

Having a different rule when ds means that foetuses with ds are afforded less rights than those without.

That is true, but the rights of the mother also need to be considered. Should a woman be forced to give birth to a child she doesn't want?
Also it's not as simple as you suggest. A woman with a healthy pregnancy has from about 5 weeks to 24 weeks to make the decision. A woman with a severely disabled baby probably doesn't find out until around 18-20 weeks at the earliest. They may then need further testing, counselling. They may not find out until much later. So to apply the same cut off to both is impractical.

DS isn't singled out within the law, as the campaign would have you believe. It refers to disabilities likely to cause severe physical or mental impairment. Some consider Downs Syndrome to be a severe impairment.’

This.down syndrome can vary in severity. Many of the very capable DS spokespeople, actors etc we see coping well with it may have milder or mosaic instances. Some are incredibly severely impacted. Many DS pregnancies miscarry naturally for this reason.

I don't think anyone takes the decision to abort lightly, especially not after 24 weeks.

@Just10moreminutesplease

Surely the issue is equality? Either abortion should be allowed at any stage regardless of reason, or it should be 24 weeks for all babies that are viable?

Having a different rule when ds means that foetuses with ds are afforded less rights than those without.

It's so difficult, isn't it? I totally agree with you about the need for equality and I'm very uneasy about treating disabled babies less favourably, but I also feel that it's wrong to force women to go ahead with a pregnancy if they feel ill equipped to care for a child with complex medical needs.

Then again, it also feels wrong to force a woman to go ahead with any pregnancy if they feel ill equipped to care for any child. But on the other hand, I cannot support aborting a child at a stage when their life is independently viable.

Making women give birth and putting the child up for adoption doesn't seem like the right answer either - it's very easy to say but I don't think many women would find it at all easy to live with, knowing that your child is out there somewhere. And there aren't enough adoptive families available anyway.

I honestly can't decide what's right and I'm glad that the decision doesn't rest with me.