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Woman dies after abortion request 'refused'

49K views 187 replies 25 participants last post by  Paul_from_Dublin 
#1 ·
The death of a woman who was 17 weeks pregnant is the subject of two investigations at University Hospital Galway in the Republic of Ireland.

Savita Halappanavar's family said she asked several times for her pregnancy to be terminated because she had severe back pain and was miscarrying.

Her family claimed it was refused because there was a foetal heartbeat. She died on 28 October.

An autopsy carried out two days later found she had died from septicaemia.

Ms Halappanavar, who was 31, was a dentist.

Her husband, Praveen, told the Irish Times that medical staff said his wife could not have an abortion because Ireland was a Catholic country and the foetus was still alive.
Substantial risk

University Hospital Galway is to carry out an internal investigation. It said it could not comment on individual cases but would be cooperating fully with the coroner's inquest into Ms Halappanavar's death.

The Health Service Executive has launched a separate investigation.

Abortion is illegal in the Republic except where there is a real and substantial risk to the life, as distinct from the health, of the mother.

The Irish government in January established a 14-member expert group to make recommendations based on a 2010 European Court of Human Rights judgment that the state failed to implement existing rights to lawful abortion where a mother's life was at risk.

A spokesperson for the Department of Health said that the group was due to report back to the Minister for Health James Reilly shortly.

"The minister will consider the group's report and subsequently submit it to government," the spokesperson said.
Funeral

Ms Halappanavar and her husband, an engineer at Boston Scientific in Galway, are originally from India.

Mr Halappanavar is still in India after accompanying his wife's body there for her funeral.

He told the Irish Times: "Savita was really in agony. She was very upset, but she accepted she was losing the baby.

"When the consultant came on the ward rounds on Monday morning, Savita asked if they could not save the baby could they induce to end the pregnancy.

"The consultant said, 'As long as there is a foetal heartbeat we can't do anything'."

The Galway Roscommon University Hospitals Group said it extended its sympathies to Ms Halappanavar's family.

In a statement the group said its inquiry into Ms Halappanavar's death had not started yet because the hospital was waiting to consult with the family.

"In general in relation to media enquiries about issues where there may be onward legal action, we must reserve our position on what action we may take if assertions about a patient's care are published and we cannot speak for individual doctors or other medical professionals if a report were to name or identify any," it said.
Absolutely disgraceful!

The abortion laws in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland are utterly illogical and in need of reform. It seems, though hardly surprising, pro-life and anti-abortion groups have been completely silent on this case......go figure!
 
#110 ·
Shatter describes abortion restrictions as ‘a great cruelty’

Ruadhan Mac Cormaic

Last Updated: Wednesday, July 24, 2013, 15:52


Minister for Justice Alan Shatter has described as a “great cruelty” the fact that women cannot have an abortion in Ireland in cases of fatal foetal abnormality.

He also said it was “an unacceptable cruelty” that abortion is not available to rape victims and said the State would ultimately have to “live up to its responsibility” in this area.

Speaking a day after the Protection of Life During Pregnancy Bill was passed by the Seanad, bringing a long and acrimonious legislative process to an end, Mr Shatter said a future government may have to put more liberal abortion proposals to the people in a referendum.

Mr Shatter said it was “of major social importance” that the Oireachtas had finally put in place a legal architecture to ensure that women and medics had certainty about the law in cases where there was a real and substantial risk to the life of a pregnant woman. But he added that the Government was constrained by the constitution from going further.

“I personally believe it is a great cruelty that our law creates a barrier to a woman in circumstances where she has a fatal foetal abnormality being able to have a pregnancy terminated, and that according to Irish law any woman in those circumstances is required to carry a child to full term knowing it has no real prospect of any nature of survival following birth,” he said.

“I think it’s unfortunate that this is an issue we cannot address. Clearly many women who find themselves in these circumstances address this issue by taking the plane or the boat to England. Despite what we have been able to do within this legislation, this will continue to be a British solution to an Irish problem.”

Mr Shatter, who was speaking at the publication of the Rape Crisis Centre’s annual report, said it was also an “unacceptable cruelty” that abortion was not available to rape victims unless there was a risk to their life.

“I think this is an issue on which the general public are a great deal more advanced than perhaps legislators are in their consideration and assessment of what should happen in these particular areas,” he said, adding that he expected a “continuing and ongoing debate” on this issue in the years to come.

“It’s not an issue that I anticipate is going to be dealt with within the lifetime of the current Government, but it is an issue I anticipate some future government may need to consider putting to the people... I do believe that as a State we have responsibilities we should live up to in this area.”

© 2013 irishtimes.com
"I think this is an issue on which the general public are a great deal more advanced than perhaps legislators are..."

Spot on.
 
#111 ·
Protection of Life During Pregnancy Bill signed into law by President Higgins
Updated: 12:17, Tuesday, 30 July 2013

President Michael D Higgins has signed into law the Protection of Life During Pregnancy Bill.

A meeting of the Council of State was held yesterday at Áras an Uachtaráin to consider the bill.

President Higgins had until tomorrow to either sign the bill into law or refer it to the Supreme Court to assess its constitutionality.

Story from RTÉ News:
http://www.rte.ie/news/2013/0730/465447-protection-of-life-during-pregnancy-bill/
...
 
#114 ·
One of Dublin's biggest hospitals cannot perform any abortions.


Priest on Mater board says hospital cannot carry out abortions
Board of governors to consider position on new law versus Mater ‘ethos’


Fr Kevin Doran: ‘The issue is broader than just abortion. What’s happening is the Minister is saying hospitals are not entitled to have an ethos.’
Wed, Aug 7, 2013, 01:00



The Mater hospital in Dublin “cannot comply” with the Protection of Life During Pregnancy Act and cannot carry out abortions, a member of its board of governors has said.

Fr Kevin Doran was speaking to The Irish Times as the board prepares to meet in the coming weeks to discuss how or whether the hospital will abide by the legislation.

The Mater Misericordiae University Hospital is one of 25 “appropriate institutions” named in the Act where abortions may be carried out to save the life of a pregnant woman.


More...

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/heal...hospital-cannot-carry-out-abortions-1.1486634
 
#116 ·
HIQA report on Savita Halappanavar case finds 'basic care' failures
Updated: 16:17, Wednesday, 09 October 2013

The Health Information and Quality Authority report on the death of Savita Halappanavar and related issues has found a failure to provide the most basic elements of care in her case.

The 257-page report found that there were many missed opportunities, which if acted on, might have changed the outcome for her.

The report was conducted after HIQA was asked by the Health Service Executive to investigate the safety, quality and standards of services provided at University Hospital Galway.

It followed the death of Mrs Halappanavar on 28 October last year.

She died one week after she was admitted to the hospital when she was 17 weeks' pregnant and miscarrying.

The report also revealed wide variations in clinical care in the 19 public maternity hospitals and units.

It stated there is no nationally agreed definition of maternal sepsis and inconsistent recording of it nationally, as well as no centralised approach to reporting maternal morbidity and mortality.

As a result, it is impossible to properly assess the performance and quality of maternity services nationally, the report found.

In the case of Mrs Halappanavar, the report said there was a failure to recognise she was developing an infection and to act on her deteriorating condition.

It found that University Hospital Galway did not have effective arrangements to regularly record and monitor her condition and that the management of the delivery of maternity services was not consistent with best practices.

The report stated the findings in the Halappanavar case bear a disturbing resemblance to the findings in the HSE inquiry into the death of Tania McCabe and her son Zach, in 2007, at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda.

HIQA makes 34 recommendations on improving the care of clinically deteriorating pregnant women.

It also called for a National Maternity Services Strategy to ensure women receive safe, high quality and reliable care.

The inquest into the death of Mrs Halappanavar took place in April and found she had died due to medical misadventure.

A HSE Clinical Review report was published in June, which found inadequate assessment and monitoring and a failure to recognise the gravity of the situation and the increasing risk to her life.

Her husband Praveen has initiated legal action against the HSE.

Speaking at the publication of the report, HIQA Director of Regulation Phelim Quinn extended his sympathies to Mr Halappanavar.

He said the report would be "a further difficult read" for him and his family.

Mr Quinn said this was not a specific investigation into Mrs Halappanavar's death, but that her death was a seminal event that led to the establishment of this statutory investigation.

Nuala Lucas, a consultant obstetric anaesthetist based in the UK who was part of the investigation team, said a key finding of the investigation was that there was a failure to recognise Mrs Halappanavar was deteriorating and then a failure to respond correctly.

Dr Lucas said there were a series of signs that could have been recognised as indications of Mrs Halappanavar's deterioration or as signs of the development of sepsis.

She said if those signs had been identified there may have been a different outcome.

HIQA Chief Executive Tracey Cooper said the recommendation for a code of conduct for employers in the health service was a fundamental development.

Ms Cooper said it was about making it absolutely explicit on what the requirements are for managers.

She said the accountability and responsibility for the following of this code would be with the HSE, and in the case of private providers, it was up to the HSE to ensure private providers would follow it.

Ms Cooper said responsibility would also be held locally by hospital groups, chief executives and their boards.

Story from RTÉ News:
http://www.rte.ie/news/2013/1009/479282-savita-halappanavar/
In the same vein...
Review after woman in Northern Ireland refused abortion
Updated: 13:40, Wednesday, 09 October 2013

Northern Ireland Health Minister Edwin Poots has appointed officials to review the case of a woman who travelled to London for an abortion as she was unable to access services in Northern Ireland.

The woman told The Nolan Show on BBC Radio Ulster this morning that she had been advised the baby had no chance of survival, but that the termination services she sought were illegal in Northern Ireland.

She said she and her husband were delighted to be expecting their first child, but they were devastated when she was told the baby had no chance of survival because it had a severe case of a condition called anencephaly.

The woman told of seeking access to abortion services in Northern Ireland, but said she was advised it would be illegal to provide them in the circumstances.

Earlier this week, the woman travelled to London, where she said she had an abortion.

A television programme, including filming carried out during her time in London, will be aired by BBC tonight.

Abortion services in very limited circumstances are available in Northern Ireland and the Stormont Assembly is currently considering proposals to amend the legislation.

Different legislation applies in England.

Story from RTÉ News:
http://www.rte.ie/news/2013/1009/479347-abortion-northern-ireland/
 
#117 ·
^^

In regard to the NI case, I think it has the potential to be a turning point for our abortion law. Public opinion has shifted in favour of greater choice and I think it's a tide some of our dinosaur politicians can't swim against.

Fair play to the woman for going public about this issue. It's something we've needed for a while.
 
#118 ·
Yeah, I think between our law and this case in the north, choice for women in this island is going to get a lot better over the next few years. It's simply not defensible nor sustainable to continue exporting this duty of care to Britain. Now that women who have made the traumatic journey are starting to speak up, politicians in parties like the DUP, FG and FF are going to find it a lot harder to justify their church-based view which prevents a woman from controlling her own body.
 
#124 ·
Father's that oppose an abortion are already heard in court, there was a case a couple of months ago in Dublin where the father opposed a woman going to England for an abortion.

At the end of the day though it's an issue between the man and woman and not a situation where wider society or the courts should be the mediator. Also, and importantly, it's the woman's choice whether to continue. She has to carry it for 9 months, raise it and if they aren't married or the pregnancy isn't wanted by the father then she'll have to look after for the next 18 or 20 years long after he's walked away from his responsibilities, something rather common in modern society.

If you get a woman pregnant that you'd no intention of staying with and raising a child with before having sex and not using protection then you really don't deserve any input at all. In effect what you're asking for is control or a veto over the woman's body, something that is enshrined in law in places like Iran, Iraq and UAE
 
#125 ·
Common it may be. But it's a small minority of fathers behave like that.

You are aware there are issues around father's rights in all sorts of areas atm at home and in the UK and other European countries.


I honestly don't know what the law is here on abortion. Regardless I wouldn't advocate any laws here that I am aware of back home.

Except maybe to do with large scale development but that's way off the beaten track of this thread.
 
#126 ·
This makes for difficult reading. The abortion issue is far from resolved, whether the politicians like it or not.

Woman refused abortion under new legislation

Saturday 16 August 2014 20.40

A young woman has had a baby delivered by caesarean section after being refused an abortion under the Country's new legislation.

The woman cannot be identified because there is a court order in place with reporting restrictions.

This was first reported in the Irish Independent this morning but more details have emerged throughout the day.

She was admitted to hospital in her second trimester wanting to have a termination.

RTÉ News understands that she was very vulnerable.

The Protection of Life During Pregnancy Act says that a termination can be carried out if a woman's life is at risk.

It includes from suicide and this can only be averted by carrying out a termination.

The legislation came into force at the beginning of this year,

The woman was assessed by a panel of three experts, It was agreed that she had suicidal thoughts and a decision was made to terminate the pregnancy by caesarean section.

It is believed that the woman wanted to have an abortion and began a hunger strike.

The Health Service Executive sought an order from the High Court to allow it to hydrate her by giving fluids.

This order was granted.

A second court date was set but later withdrawn after the woman agreed to have the baby delivered by caesarean section a few days later.

This was performed when she was 24 going on 25 weeks pregnant.

The baby is being cared for in hospital at the moment.

Story from RTÉ News:
http://www.rte.ie/news/2014/0816/637562-abortion-refusal/
Abortion guidelines North and South deny women their rights under law

Eamonn McCann

Last Updated: Wednesday, August 13, 2014, 17:43


North and South, proposed guidelines on abortion deny women their rights under the law. The guidelines also do not reflect the majority view of the public in either jurisdiction.

Abortion law in the North derives from the 1937 Bourne judgment in which a doctor who had performed an abortion on a 14-year-old pregnant as a result of rape was acquitted of any offence. At the time, the operative law across the UK was the 1861 Offences Against the Person Act. This made abortion a crime and laid down a penalty of up to life imprisonment.

The Bourne judgment made abortion legal if carrying a pregnancy to full term would leave the woman “a physical or mental wreck”.

The 1967 Abortion Act was designed to provide clarity on the judgment. However, the Act wasn’t extended to the North, where Bourne still holds but where, 47 years later, practice still doesn’t follow the Bourne ruling.

Neither the Stormont Parliament, abolished in 1972, nor the Assembly, established under the 1998 agreement has moved to bring practice into line with the law. The Democratic Unionist Party has spelled it out that the capacity of the devolved institution to thwart extension of the Act was a crucial factor in its acceptance of the devolution deal.

The vulnerability of all main Northern parties to “pro-life” pressure was on clear display in 2008 when proposals at Westminster to give Northern women the same rights as women in Britain were scuppered, at least in part by a letter sent to every MP and signed by party leaders Ian Paisley snr, Gerry Adams, Sir Reg Empey and Mark Durkan urging rejection of the proposal.

Liberal stance

Unwillingness to face down the “pro-life” lobby was again evident in the run-up to last April’s local and European elections. “Pro-life” group Precious Life, angered by Sinn Féin’s relatively liberal stance in the South, included the party in its list of “pro-abortion” groups to be shunned at the polls. The party responded with a statement saying: “We are not pro-choice and we are not in favour of abortion [other than] where a pregnant woman’s life is in danger . . . This is a position shared by the SDLP and the DUP and Catholic bishop John McAreavey.”

The statement was withdrawn when the bishop challenged the depiction of his position and complained about being drawn into a political wrangle.

Succession of judgments

The legal position remains as established by Bourne. The Northern courts’ interpretation of Bourne has been set out in a succession of judgments, including in the 1993 K case in which Mr Justice Shiel ruled that a pregnant 14-year-old threatening suicide was legally entitled to an abortion because “to allow the pregnancy to continue to full term would result in [the girl] being a physical and mental wreck.”

No doctor could be found to provide the girl with the legal procedure. She had her abortion in England.

All recent surveys of Northern public opinion show acceptance of abortion in much wider circumstances than in K. But the Department of Health under the DUP’s Edwin Poots has paid no attention to this or to the law and issued guidelines restating that abortion is a serious crime and dropping the “physical or mental wreck” ground for legal termination.

In the South, too, the leaked abortion guidelines for implementation of the Protection of Life During Pregnancy Act, passed last year following the death of Savita Halappanavar, impose restrictions not required or implied in the law as it operated prior to Ms Halappanavar’s death.

The new law was intended “to make provision for reviews at the instigation of a pregnant woman of certain medical opinions given in respect of pregnancy”. This didn’t necessarily contradict the ruling in the X case in 1992, which declared risk of suicide a ground for legal abortion.

There was no basis in the 1992 ruling for the procedure envisaged in the new Act and significantly sharpened in the guidelines, requiring a woman seeking an abortion on ground of risk of suicide to ask her GP to refer her to three doctors for decision. If turned down, she could appeal to three other doctors.

Potentially, then, a desperate woman might have to discuss her situation with up to seven doctors and try to convince them that she might commit suicide. Despite Ms Halappanavar’s death, far from being enhanced, women’s rights will be diminished.

In both jurisdictions, a frantic “pro-life” rearguard action has persuaded politicians to back off from meaningful change, even if existing law provides for real change and meets the wishes of a majority of citizens.

Politicians North and South have occasional differences, but when it comes to women’s rights, they are brothers under the skin.

© 2014 irishtimes.com
 
#134 ·
that is horrific. that's the worst thing i've read in a while. on a par with some of the isis in iraq stuff to be blunt.

oh yes we'll change the abortion laws and you can have one now - as long as you submit to the major operation of having your womb slashed open for no medical reason.
 
#127 ·
Odlum - "I do not want to see abortion as some sort of readily available commodity in this country. I think that is wrong"

Difficult subject. I would say most people would agree with you...until they feel that they need to avail of an abortion. Would you prohibit women from traveling to get around Irish law? If Britain prohibited abortions for non nationals would that change your opinion? Nobody would say that an abortion is an ideal solution to a problem but a blanket ban in almost all circumstances to placate extremists is highly problematic and smacks of politicians parking their heads in the sand as usual.
 
#128 ·
So that young vulnerable woman was forcibly given fluids and made to give birth by caesarean against her will.

How utterly barbaric, any nation or court that inflicts such judgements should be ashamed.


As for the North, our politicians can't even agree on the most basic of things I've no hope they'll reform abortion. I think the issue up here will be ultimately be decided by the courts.
 
#130 ·
What a wicked shameless country. You would think that after the Magdalene laundries affair they would have learnt their lesson, obviously they haven't

If the EU doesn't kick Ireland out for their appalling behaviour I hope that the European Court of Human Rights will do something about it. Ireland is a pariah state and needs to be isolated :bash:
 
#131 ·
Didn't think it could get worse, but it does:

Woman sought abortion at eight weeks

Kitty Holland, Harry McGee

Last Updated: Monday, August 18, 2014, 06:24


The young woman at the centre of the latest abortion controversy first asked for a termination in early April, when she was about eight weeks’ pregnant, The Irish Times has learned.

The family of the woman, who was refused an abortion but was later delivered by Caesarean section, is being briefed by a friend on her welfare this morning.

The friend, who is from the same country as the woman but has lived in Ireland for more than 10 years, spoke to The Irish Times over the weekend. He said the woman had been seeking information about abortion from authorities for up to three months before approaching a GP herself last month. The GP referred her to hospital.

Pregnant

It was reported over the weekend she had been in her second trimester when she found out she was pregnant and asked for an abortion. This is disputed by her friend and a medical source familiar with the case, who said the woman found out she was pregnant four months ago and she requested an abortion then.

She arrived in the State this year. Her friend, who works in a university here, said the woman had been raped in her own country and found out she was pregnant when she underwent a medical assessment “a week or two after she arrived” in the State. “She told them immediately, ‘I do not want this. I am too young to be a mother. I am not ready,’” he said. She also feared for her safety as a result of the pregnancy.

Increasingly distressed

He said she was not given information as to how to obtain an abortion and as the pregnancy continued she became increasingly distressed. He was advised she should go to a GP, which she did in mid-July. The GP gave her a letter for a hospital, he said, and she was admitted. She was told in hospital on July 22nd an abortion was not possible as the pregnancy was too far advanced.

Sources within the HSE confirmed it was not aware of her situation until mid-July by which stage she was at over 20 weeks. The woman went on hunger and thirst strike at this stage and a panel of experts was convened. The HSE appointed legal representation for her. The psychiatrists agreed she was suicidal, while the obstetrician said the baby could be delivered. The Caesarean was carried out in the last fortnight.

© 2014 irishtimes.com
Time to repeal the eighth amendment.
 
#132 · (Edited)
Disgusting. The poor woman was raped and at risk of suicide and was refused an abortion, in contravention of the law and against the medical opinion of two of the three-member panel, forced to have fluids pumped into her and then a foetus of only 24 weeks was delivered by caesarean, the result of which commonly leads to deformities, brain damage and stunted growth.

Absolutely disgusting.

Odlum will probably come on and say she deserved it, probably wearing the wrong clothes or was drinking. Given his previous statements about abortion and women.
 
#133 ·
The NI Department of Justice is moving ahead with it's own reforms.


David Ford: NI abortion consultation 'ready by autumn'


The Justice Department will publish proposals for abortion law changes in NI by autumn, unless there is a joint approach with the Department of Health.

Justice Minister David Ford made the announcement as he called for a single consultation on changing Northern Ireland's abortion laws, not two. He said his department is preparing a consultation dealing with rape, incest and fatal foetal abnormality cases.

He was speaking following an abortion controversy in the Republic of Ireland.

Mr Ford said in cases of rape, incest and terminal foetal abnormality, a change in Northern Ireland's criminal law was required, and the Department of Justice was preparing a consultation paper.

However, he said it was the Department of Health's responsibility to set out the premise for lawful abortion in Northern Ireland.

He said it would be better if the public consultations ran concurrently and called for both departments to work together on one single consultation He said he had written to Health Minister Edwin Poots before the Northern Ireland Assembly's summer recess, asking him to consider the suggestion.

Mr Ford said if that did not happen, then the Department of Justice would bring forward its own consultation paper in the autumn.

The justice minister was responding to criticism from the Ulster Unionist Party MLA Roy Beggs, who sits on the Assembly's health committee. Mr Beggs criticised the length of time it has taken to introduce new abortion guidelines.

Mr Ford told BBC Radio Ulster's Talkback programme: "It's actually extremely difficult to define the kind of circumstances in which a termination might be possible in the case of terminal abnormality.

"Would you have to define specific illnesses? Would it be matter of leaving it to consultants to give an opinion? "Those are the kind of issues which have had to be considered. "There has been help given by officials from the Department of Health to my officials and we now have a document ready to go around that, but clearly it is a difficult issue.

"It's morally difficult for many people, but it's an issue that has to be addressed in Northern Ireland."

Mr Ford first confirmed that he was going to consult on changing abortion laws, to allow women carrying babies with fatal foetal abnormalities to have a termination, in December last year. At the time, he said he hoped the consultation document would be ready by Easter. Fatal foetal abnormality is currently not grounds for abortion under Northern Ireland law.

In October 2013, Northern Ireland woman Sarah Ewart contacted the BBC to highlight her personal experience of having to choose between travelling to Great Britain for an abortion or carrying on with her pregnancy, after doctors told her the child had no chance of survival.
 
#135 ·
The pro abortion lobby knew something like this would happen under the trojan horse suicide amendment - that is why they wanted it put in.

Time for a straight vote - do you want all access abortion in this country or do you not? Yes or no?

That will clear this up once and for all. All this halfway stuff is dangerous as shown.
 
#138 ·
Yeah.....the story is still shocking. Utterly shameful situation, that poor woman :eek:hno:



Woman in abortion case tells of suicide attempt

During pregnancy woman says she was told she could have an abortion


The young woman who was refused an abortion and later had her pregnancy delivered by Caesarean section, has spoken of her attempt to take her own life when she was 16 weeks pregnant.

She says she was a victim of rape before she came to Ireland earlier this year and she found out she was pregnant during a medical check soon after. In an interview with The Irish Times she says she immediately expressed her desire to die rather than bear her rapist’s child, when she was eight weeks and four days pregnant.

She was admitted to hospital last month expressing suicidal ideation at 24 weeks pregnant. She was initially told she could not have an abortion as the pregnancy was too far progressed.

Hunger strike

She began a thirst and hunger strike and a panel of three experts – two psychiatrists and one obstetrician – was convened. She was certified as suicidal and it was agreed the pregnancy should be terminated. A High Court order was also obtained to rehydrate and feed her.

She says she was then told she would have the abortion, but was later told in fact the only option open to her was a Caesarean section. “They said the pregnancy was too far. It was going to have to be a Caesarean section... They said, wherever you go in the world, the United States, anywhere, at this point it has to be a Caesarean,” she said. She felt she didn’t have a choice.

The section was performed on her earlier this month. She was discharged a week later and is receiving psychiatric care in the community. The baby, whom she has not had contact with, remains in hospital.

Looking very thin, fragile and about four years younger than her age, she said she attempted to take her own life at 16 weeks pregnant, when told the costs of travelling to Britain for an abortion could be as high as €1,500.
“In my culture it is a great shame to be pregnant if not married,” the young woman remarks. She says she returned to the place where she lives on being told of the costs of travelling to England by a counsellor at the Irish Family Planning Association. She says she attempted to take her own life but was disturbed by someone.

She was not assessed for her suicidality under the Protection of Life During Pregnancy Act until she went to see a GP last month, who referred her on to a hospital psychiatrist.

Suffering

“When I came to this country I thought I could forget suffering... The scar [from the C-section] will never go away. It will always be a reminder. I still suffer. I don’t know if what has happened to me is normal. She adds: “I just wanted justice to be done. For me, this is injustice.”

The director general of the Health Service Executive has requested that a report be completed for him that establishes all of the facts surrounding the care given to the woman. The report is expected to be completed by the end of September.

“Through the Report the Director General will seek to establish the full facts surrounding the matter, the sequence of events, the care given to the woman involved, the operation of the 2013 Act and any learnings that can be gleaned from the case,” the HSE said in a statement.
 
#137 ·
Odlum - "Time for a straight vote - do you want all access abortion in this country or do you not? Yes or no?"

That's exactly the kind of black and white thinking that has got us into what is by any standards, an extraordinary constitutional mess.

The solution is first repeal everything that has been put into the constitution about abortion since the first of a stupid series of amendments was passed in 1983.

Then the media has to behave itself by not treating every utterance from the extremes of the debate as the latest heightening of the abortion crisis.

Then the politicians have to face down the extremists and fanatics pass a reasonable abortion law like anywhere else.

Then we have to move on.
 
#139 ·
I don't always agree with Fintan O'Toole but I have to say this time he is spot on.
160,000 reasons to take action on abortion

Fintan O'Toole

Last Updated: Tuesday, August 19, 2014, 14:17


If you’re reading this on a train or a bus, have a look around you. There is every chance that you will see a woman who has had an abortion. It might be that sharply dressed middle-aged lady. It might be the sweet granny taking her grandkids to the zoo. It might be the student going over her lecture notes.

At least 160,000 Irish women have had abortions abroad since 1980. That’s close to one in 10 of the female population aged between 14 and 64. These women are our mothers, sisters, daughters, friends, neighbours. Yet abortion is part of official discourse only when a new atrocity breaks the surface of a deep silence.

It takes some grotesque tormenting of a woman – such as the latest case in which a suicidal woman was forced by court order to continue a pregnancy that resulted from rape – for an everyday reality to be acknowledged.

That reality is plain: Irish women have abortions and Irish people are OK with it. They agree that women should be free to have abortions in England under a very wide set of criteria. In 1992, when there was a referendum on the right to travel outside the State to have an abortion, Youth Defence spelt out very clearly what this meant from an anti-abortion perspective: “The word ‘travel’ is being used by cowardly politicians and others as a cover-up for the violent and vicious killing of defenceless Irish babies by English doctors.” If you believe that abortion is murder, this was the truth. The Irish people voted for it nonetheless, by 62 per cent to 38 per cent. This made it abundantly clear that, for all the rhetoric and all the silences, most Irish people, even then, did not actually believe in banning abortion.

Regime does not reflect public opinion

Even in relation to abortions within Ireland, it is clear the current, punitively restrictive regime does not reflect public opinion. In an Irish Times poll in June 2013 81 per cent said abortion should be allowed in cases of rape or abuse, with just 10 per cent saying it should not. Asked whether abortion should be permitted if the foetus is not capable of surviving outside the womb, 83 per cent said it should, with 8 per cent saying it should not.

And yet, we somehow end up imposing in the most cruel way the views of a small rump of the population on abused and suicidal women. There’s a lot of talk about the tyranny of majorities but this is a clear case of the tyranny of a small minority. For all the lazy talk of abortion as a “divisive” issue, the truth is that the vast bulk of public opinion is on one side of the divide – the side that wants the law to allow women in awful circumstances to make their own choices.

The real division, in fact, is between most Irish people on the one side and the political and legal regime on the other. It exists because, when it comes to abortion, we are almost literally living in the past.

This whole mess goes back to a very specific moment in Irish history – the last stand of theocratic Catholicism. For a short period in the late 1970s and early 1980s, it seemed possible to the Catholic hierarchy and to militant lay Catholics that the old regime of church control of legislation on family, sexuality and reproduction could be preserved.

This was not primarily about abortion – contraception, divorce and homosexuality were much more pertinent questions at the time. But abortion was seen, correctly, as what the Christian right in the US would call a “wedge issue” – a cultural and emotional redoubt behind which conservatives could rally.

This attempted counter-revolution is the one and only reason why abortion is in the Constitution. And it wasn’t even a successful counter-revolution. It had some temporary success in galvanising conservative Ireland for a last stand. But it did absolutely nothing to stop abortions – there were 3,650 in 1982 before the anti-abortion amendment to the Constitution and 3,946 in 1984 after it.

And it failed in its larger goals of stopping reforms on contraception, homosexuality and (eventually) divorce. The constitutional provisions on abortion are just the tattered vestiges of an old disappointment, the beer cans and torn ponchos left on the sodden field the day after a festival of self-righteousness, the detritus of the ecstatic picnic of theocracy’s final fling.

Torturing women

It is one thing to torture women for a coherent principle, backed up by a deep moral consensus. (Not a good thing, of course, but at least a serious thing.) But it is outrageous to break the will of already vulnerable women on the rack of a long-discarded ideology.

There’s something sick in a system where the horrific reality of forced pregnancy matters less than the preservation of what amount to constitutional catchphrases with as much relevance to contemporary Ireland as Maoist slogans have in today’s China.

This tyranny of an old failure has to stop. There will be referendums next year, and one of them should be to remove abortion from the Constitution and put it where it should be – into the ordinary Irish reality where most of us live.

© 2014 irishtimes.com
 
#142 ·
go on oddlum - would you like your internal organs slashed open by the state? would you like to give up 9 months of your life as an enforced incubator for the result of rape? or would you like to find out you were a child of rape?
 
#143 ·
How many times do we have to screw up on abortion in this country before we get it right? Make it available in the way it is in every other EU member state (except the even more extreme Malta) and then actually trust women to know what's best for them and the foetus growing within them.
 
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