New abortion laws

[Cheesetoastie537]

TW

I'm pro choice but the new potential abortion law changes feel a bit extreme to me. If I've understood right, if a woman was even in late stage of pregnancy (even say 35 weeks) could self abort the pregnancy and not face any charges for the death of a viable baby. I thought the 24 week mark was there for that reason. I know a woman still can't get a medically assisted abortion after 24 weeks (unless certain circumstances) but surely they'll just go home and do it now because theres nothing preventing them. No one should be in that situation surely. But if it was a case that a late pregnancy is now not wanted but a medically assisted abortion is not available and the woman knows they can do it themselves with no charges, wouldn't that just increase self done abortions?

If anything, shouldn't the law just change so that medical abortion at any stage is allowed then to at least make it safe for woman rather than them attempting a self abortion.

I'm not sure if the change in law opens up more issues than it fixes. And in part I feel that there's no protection for late pregnancies that the baby would have survived and now there's no legal charges for their life.

I've never really thought too much about abortion otherthan pro choice and felt the UK had a good middle ground.

There's a spectacularly grim article on how the Netherlands (linking to the assisted dying debate) apply end stage care to pre term babies that i'll dig out. There's being born and being able to survive. It's also quite depressing that so many of the late term termination in that Atlantic article are for disabilities. Again, a link to the assisted dying debate

Found it

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/nov/19/look-theyre-getting-skin-the-moral-challenge-of-saving-the-worlds-tiniest-babies

Trigger warning etc

Her amendment wasn’t voted on

Okay, not sure if this is the place to ask

I'm coming across quite a lot of misinformation on this

Also people who don't seem to understand what a late termination involves. There's one particular person to whom I would like to send some information.

Does anyone have a good link to anything medical about this EG journal article.

I am puzzled how many people think that a woman would actually want to go through this.

There is always a cut off point. The debate is where it should be.

I would say any baby that has a good chance of life outside of the womb should be given that chance of life.

I'm sure you would agree at a certain point as well? If a woman comes in actively in labour, very close to giving birth, should she be allowed to have an abortion right then? Surely no.

So the debate comes back to where the cut off point lies. For me it's somewhere around 24 weeks, for you it's clearly later. Agree to disagree.

Labour would be my cut off point.

If late term, potentially illegal abortions of healthy babies doesn’t happen much as pp indicate then there’s no need to change the law. Personally in those rare situations where somebody knowingly terminates a healthy, viable baby later term by taking abortions pills for example then I think prosecution should be an option.

The point at which a baby could survive in the outside world with some medical intervention seems a sensible cut off point where we must consider safeguarding the unborn baby.

Hopefully people with more sense will block this. The Labour Party couldn’t even agree what a woman was until recently, now they’re trying to make it legal to terminate a full term baby. I think the majority of the public will definitely NOT be onboard with this.

So if it's a post 24 week death at home, then it still needs to be investigated by the police to establish whether the baby was born alive and whether it's parents failed to get it help?

Absolutely not. That's the stuff this law will protect women from. The police have no business investigating pregnancy loss.

I think it's a way to try and decriminalise desperate women.

You're not getting it. Or maybe you don't want to. This law is about protecting women who have late term miscarriages or premature labour, and who may have Googled some things. They haven't otherwise done anything - but they are ending up at the sharp end of police investigations and the courts, and this has been increasing. The stress and trauma are immense. It's torture - and there are people on here who are perfectly OK with that.

Which is one reason why this new amendment is pointless at preventing these sorts of investigations.

How in those cases do you know if it was a stillbirth or the baby was born alive and not help was called (likely manslaughter) or just plain murder?

Just because DIY abortion is going to be legal, manslaughter and murder of newborns is not, so it would be still important to investigate.

The medical investigation determines whether the loss was in utero or live birth. If live birth, the case is passed to the police.

The police have no business investigating PREGNANCY loss.

I've linked this above, but I recommend reading this article before stating no woman would want this https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2023/05/dr-warren-hern-abortion-post-roe/674000/

Evil.

That's not only immoral its also utterly irrational.

Why at labour? You do realise an abortion at that stage would involve killing the foetus in utero and then inducing labour so the woman delivers a dead baby?

What is your rationale for labour being the cut off point?

@Thatsalineallright not sure why you wanted me to read the article. I have read it.

Maybe I should clarify my language.

It's not something any woman would want if it could be avoided. I'm finding it's being discussed as if women can just leave it to the last minute to think about whether or not they want to have the child. Or as if you can just ring the doctor at 30 weeks and say "I'd like an abortion, please." Which is clearly not what's happening.

I wonder if other countries had so many issues with this.

if people are genuinely horrified at the lack of criminalisation in these situations, then I can accept that as their view. I don't agree with it - but people are entitled to their view.

It seems a great shame to me that this was the only way to tackle it.

I can't work out if the problem is

the wording of the law

the fact that people genuinely do want women to be investigated if they have a late miscarriage or do something desperate to terminate a pregnancy

if accounts in the press have confused people.

Of course I know how late term abortions work.

I don't see the need for abortion to have any legal limit when it should be a medical decision between a woman and medical professionals.

Labour is the start of the birth process so it is rational to me that if there has to be a cut off, it should be then. I don't see how it's any less irrational that basing it on when a born baby could survive outside of the womb since they aren't surviving alone outside of the womb and babies have survived earlier than 24 weeks.

Again, it's also irrelevant if a born baby can survive when an aborted foetus clearly isn't going to survive

Nah.

Evil.

You already said that.

You don't get scans before 10 weeks normally anyway

Am sure that I will be shot down in flames.

As a Roman Catholic, I'm against abortion. My MIL was born in 1925, she was adopted. If she had been aborted my DH & his brothers wouldn't exist neither would their & our children, or grandchildren.

My beautiful children have saved many lives, DD a nurse, 2 of our DS served in Special Forces & although they can't talk about it, I have no doubt they saved many lives.

I support those poor women who've been raped or suffered abuse but there are many families who would be so happy to accept these babies into their family. rather than kill the baby.

Sitting back & waiting to be abused.

Not abusing you. But consider this: early stage abortion is far, far safer than carrying a pregnancy to term and giving birth. Why should a woman who has been raped or abused then be forced to risk her long term health - because birth injuries are still very common - just to breed babies for other people? I would call that cruelty.

And let's face it, it was the Roman Catholic Church which initially excommunicated a 9 year old girl who was raped by a family member and became pregnant, then had an abortion. It doesn't actually matter that they were forced to row back from that - it was the first thing they thought to do. Faith does not exempt you from having decency and compassion. You can be against abortion for yourself, but you have no right to dictate that for other women.

It's a deliberately extreme position to illustrate the utter ridiculousness of the bizarre and extreme scenarios posited by many people on this thread who don't want to protect women from being thrown into the court system when they have done nothing wrong.

If you're against abortion, don't have one. Your religious beliefs are irrelevant since not everyone shares your religion.

I'm a Catholic. I'm fine with this legistlation.

The law exists for all people, not just Catholics. Also I don't not trust my church to get involved in women's pregnancies because of its history.

Oddly goady.

If you’re against abortion, don’t have one. It’s quite simple. Doesn’t mean you have the right to remove that choice from others who don’t believe in your deity.