AIBU to be think that most women would be jailed for their abortions as so many of us embellish?

[Upsetaboutabortionbeingacrime]

1 in 3 women in this country obtain abortions at some point in their lives.

I sincerely believe that as abortion is a criminal act in the UK and to obtain one without being open to prosecution, a woman needs two doctors to permit it. because of this many many many women emphasise and maybe even embellish, or lie, to obtain that. Will it really mean you cannot afford your rent / mortgage and you'll be homeless? Probably not, but you just DO NOT want a(nother) baby. And actually a woman should be able to just NOT WANT a(nother) pregnancy or a(nother) child. Yet the woman is forced to say what needs to be said procure an abortion.

Therefore thousands of women every year would be jailed just like this woman has been.

The jailing was NOT because of the late term of the pregnancy, it was because she lied to obtain it and therefore she's in jail.

Lots and lots women have done that. Lots.

she wasn't a naïve teenager who may not have realised she was pregnant, but a mature woman with earlier pregnancies who was too embarrassed to tell her partner she'd slept with someone else while she was apart from partner.

How can you possibly know the ins and outs?

Because this was all part of the court case and reported on?

Mental health sections need an AMPH, that person does not necessarily need to be a doctor.

She made her choices. All for entirely selfish reasons. That baby suffered horrendously as the drugs used at that stage would have caused a slow agonising death. She got what she deserved. She gave no thought to her other children when trying to avoid being caught shagging two men concurrently. She was hardly a shining example of motherhood was she?

I don't agree with what she did ...it's awful, but nor do I agree with forced birthing of babies people don't want. So it's a moral nightmare.
Ultimately ...are we just vessels for children? If you think so then Gilead is that way➡

Plus people change their mind in pregnancy ...it's a real dilemma for many.
She sounds like a messed up woman in a messed up case tbh and it's very sad.

So were mine and I agree

The foetus wasn't really aborted. Due to the drugs she took a viable baby was born in distress and died because of that trauma.

I agree with previous posters that I am pro choice but not once the baby is viable. That is different in every pregnancy.

I also agree with other posters though that it is all incredibly sad.

This is my stance. I actually think she got off lightly tbh.

I dont care how it was conceived - any woman (or child) who does not want to be pregant, should be able to terminate the pregnancy

If you police the method of conception, then you are not pro life, you are pro punishment for having sex for fun

If the MHA section requires an AMPH it also requires at least one Dr, usually 2.

There's also a fair few serving long sentences for violent crimes including murder and crimes of sexual violence.

It's silly to spread misinformation that there are 'only about 4' women in prison who are a risk to the public.

I can think of several high profile cases just in the last few months.

And if you stopped incarcerating anybody who had a history of trauma or drug abuse, you'd have to include 1000s of men.

Derail: for most mental health sections two doctors (one who has been on a special course -section 12 approved) and an AMHP are involved. The AMPH is a social worker on an approved list (they may well have to do a special course as well - I don’t know that boy).

the point I was making is that abortion is not a special case where more than one healthcare professional is required to agree.

GPs and all HCPs are allowed to consciencely object to signing abortion act paperwork (when there is not a grave risk to life/health/mental health) and I have witnessed some debate if that includes not giving details of alternative ways to patients, however the gmc gives clear guidance that just saying “I don’t do that” isn’t ok and that if the patient is vulnerable you have to arrange for them to see someone else yourself rather than just giving a website etc….

Nowadays women wanting an abortion can generally skip the GP and just contact https://www.bpas.org/ and it is then in the vast majority of instances funded by the nhs (just like the women in the court case did).

i struggle with the term “forced birth” as when you have got past a certain stage of pregnancy like this women had birth is coming abortion or not. A late stage medical abortion is in the act of the pregnancy leaving the women’s body a “birth” in all practical aspects - contractions, pushing, pain, bleeding, afterbirth, midwife present etc - the same as an other vaginal delivery at that gestation - other than the fact a live baby is not the result. It’s a medically caused stillbirth.

I’m not trying to be insensitive in any way to those that have had late term abortions or are considering one, as I don’t think it’s at all useful to ignore biology/ a late term abortion does not remove the physical requirement to labour. The pregnancy tissue has to come out somehow - surgically or vaginally - the pregnancy can’t be made to disappear with a pill. The delivered pregnancy will (other than in some very upsetting conditions) look to the external eye like a (small) baby which is usually welcome to the mother who has had to make the very difficult decision to have a late abortion of a usually very wanted baby who has been found to have a condition not compatible with life.

I do wonder if the women in this case thought that the pill(s) she took would make the pregnancy disappear - she didn’t want anyone to find out - but at 30/32 weeks there is no way she could do that - abortion east access or not she was always going to have to “birth” the baby

This is a classic example of “Hard cases making bad law” or in this case bad debate. We really shouldn’t use the example of one woman’s actions to reformulate laws or underpin debate. Especially given we don’t know why she did what she did and many people are filling in the gaps.

There is a fundamental inconsistency in UK law re abortion. Northern Ireland now has laws which provide women with the right to an unconditional abortion up to 12 weeks. In the rest of the UK that right is conditional. This perhaps is what the OP wanted to highlight but did so in a poor way.

The distinction may seem nuanced given that abortions are approved conditionally without any evidence required. However I would support the right to unconditional abortions up to a point and thereafter require them to be medically approved and supervised.

I do however believe there should be criminal recourse to deal with anyone causing the unlawful death of a viable baby. I’m not convinced the mother should be excluded from this.

Yes but you're really simplifying it by saying 'she was too embarrassed.' You can't possibly know what she was going through mentally.

We do know she had moved back in with her estranged partner, had previously been having sex with 2 men and was not sure who Fatherered the baby, and was concealing the pregnancy from her estranged partner who she'd moved back in with.

Who was referred to as her ex-partner when he wrote a letter to the Judge at the point of sentencing so presumably became her ex at some point after the abortion.

All of these facts were in the sentencing remarks so although we don't know her exact motivations for the late-term abortion, we do know what psychosocial factors were present at the time. And she had 2 psychiatric reports completed pre-sentencing where no MH diagnosis could be made.

I struggled with that post. It's gross hyperbole to suggest that society being concerned about the illegal abortion of a 32 week foetus is leading to Gilead. And as you say , by that stage it was always going to be a birth.

Sentencing report.

Sentencing report

That's not a pre-sentencing report, which would have been completed by the probation service and the 2 different psychiatrists.

They're sentencing remarks by the Judge which did include the information I referred to.

You were, I accept,
in emotional turmoil as you sought to hide the pregnancy.
20.I have carefully considered psychiatric reports from Drs Gupta and Kennedy, the
Pre-Sentence Report; and letters from your former partner, the baby’s father and a
teacher at your son’s school. You were not suffering from any serious mental illness
at the time of this offence. I accept, however, that there is evidence of emotionally
unstable personality traits. More significantly, I accept that you feel very deep and
genuine remorse for your actions. You are wracked by guilt and have suffered
depression. I also accept that you had a very deep emotional attachment to your
unborn child and that you are plagued by nightmares and flashbacks to seeing your
dead child’s face.

I think maybe this sums up her state of mind more accurately than 'she was embarrassed.'

It doesn't follow that doing something you don't want to do creates a risk to your mental health

Well thank God the law understands that an unplanned / unwanted pregnancy is a little more than "doing something you don't want to" and that forcing a woman to continue with a pregnancy she does not want is going to be damaging and detrimental to her MH.

I am astonished that you consider yourself to be pro choice @Upsetaboutabortionbeingacrime is your username ironic? Or are you conflating the recent case in the news and all abortions? I am very confused about your intentions with this thread to be honest.

This isn't about why anyone has an abortion.

Criteria a) of the law is that the continuance of the (sub 24 week) pregnancy poses greater risk to the health of the mother than termination.

All pregnancies pose greater risk to the mother than termination - pregnancy is not good for you, it carries many health risks. Therefore it is really about the mother's choice before 24 weeks.