24 Week Abortions

Anyone reading about the debate between the Tories and Labour in England about reducing the maximum number of weeks a female can choose to abort a fetus at? It currently stands at 24 weeks, the Tories want it initially reduced to 20 weeks, with possible reductions in review, Labour want it maintained at 24 weeks.

Personally I think it's ridiculous that a fetus can be aborted at 24 weeks. I'm pro-choice, but I can't see how it can be considered okay to abort a fetus at 6 months when there has been cases of premature babies being born at this stage and surviving. If the fetus is capable, or even has a chance, of living outside of it's host than it should be given that chance I feel so I'd be in favour of restricting the maximum time back to 20, or even 18 weeks, with special dispensation given in extraordinary circumstances (life of the host in danger, undetected pregnancy caused after an assault), whats peoples opinions on it though?*

* I realise threads on abortion on any forum have a short shelf life before they are consigned to the rubbish before anyone points it out

For what reasons are you pro-choice?

It seems like you are pro-choice until the fetus has a chance of survival outside the womb, and then you are not pro-choice any more.

Is it more acceptable to abort a fetus which couldn't survive outside the womb than one which could?

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Originally Posted by jebus

I realise threads on abortion on any forum have a short shelf life before they are consigned to the rubbish before anyone points it out

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Yeah this is bound to get hijacked pretty soon. :(

I watched some of the report on BBC News last night and was shocked at the numbers. The BBC reported that there are 206,000 terminations per year in England and Wales. I had a quick look for the number of live births per year, which is around the 650,000 (for England & Wales). That means that about 24% of all pregnancies end in termination, which would strike me as extremely high no matter what side of the debate you are on.

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Originally Posted by osarusan

For what reasons are you pro-choice?

It seems like you are pro-choice until the fetus has a chance of survival outside the womb, and then you are not pro-choice any more.

Is it more acceptable to abort a fetus which couldn't survive outside the womb than one which could?

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In my mind yes. I don't consider a fetus a living being until it is able to live independently of it's host/mother, so I have no issues with someone choosing to abort, say, a 2 month fetus as I still don't consider it technically alive

My friend gave birth to twins after 25 weeks.
Girls are in perfect health and just passed their 1st birthday.

I'm pro choice but 24 weeks is too late

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Originally Posted by jebus

In my mind yes. I don't consider a fetus a living being until it is able to live independently of it's host/mother, so I have no issues with someone choosing to abort, say, a 2 month fetus as I still don't consider it technically alive

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Host / Mother:confused:

Very telling use of terminology IMO

My concern is the widely accepted notion that children can live, as you put it "independently" after their birth.

The loss of either or both parents to a child after they are born (whether through accident, neglect, separation, economic necessity...whatever) is a huge disadavantage to the "viability" of that life for "its" future imho.

I'm pro-choice. I feel a foetus is not alive until it's out of the mother.

I'm well aware of the development of the foetus but I still think until the foetus comes out of the mother, it's not alive.

Im against it, if i was ever in the situation i would definetly keep the baby i see very little reason to abort. there is exceptional circumstances all right but it should be just that exceptional looking at the numbers going for abortions there cant be that many exceptional cases.

24 weeks is a discrace. As some one said in the debate the other night it means you could have doctors in one room working to save a baby while in the other room giving an abortion on a baby of the same age.

Exceptional circumstances should include medical reasons, victims of insest, rape, child abuse etc.

Yes but nature and circumstance will take its course if both parents die after a child has been born, both parents could die, but the baby might get picked up by the health services and go on to live, but thats all down to circumstance.

If you were to take a two month old fetus out of a host (I call it that because I assume the female doesn't consider herself a mother) it wouldn't be fully formed and would have died immediatly upon seperation from the female. Two very different scenarios in my opinion

* In response to MyTown

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Originally Posted by superfrank

I'm pro-choice. I feel a foetus is not alive until it's out of the mother.

I'm well aware of the development of the foetus but I still think until the foetus comes out of the mother, it's not alive.

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Think you ll be hard pushed to find support for 9 month abortions :D

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Originally Posted by anto1208

Think you ll be hard pushed to find support for 9 month abortions :D

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Always liked the part in the Simpsons where Kang is running for President as Bill Clinton,

'Abortions for all!' boos from the crowd
'Okay, no abortions for anyone!' boos from the crowd
'Okay, abortions for some, minature American flags for the others' Cheers from the crowd

:D:D

BBC News

Very emotive topic but I suppose at least British MPs honest enough to debate in the first place. Irish politicians are scared of this topic

Seems like they had a number of votes ranging on limits from 12-24 weeks. Labour allowed an open vote on this too.

Almost all abortions under 12 weeks (less than 10%) anyway as seen in this graph so strange to see it was not lowered. Seems medical experts said would make no difference to foetus survival rate when compare 24 to 20 weeks & this apparently is why 24 weeks was set originally.

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Originally Posted by pete

Very emotive topic but I suppose at least British MPs honest enough to debate in the first place. Irish politicians are scared of this topic.

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I was thinking the same watching the news yesterday, there is no way a politician on this island would touch this subject, let alone openly debate it, sad indictment of this island's rooted in Catholicism attitudes to be honest

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Originally Posted by jebus

Personally I think it's ridiculous that a fetus can be aborted at 24 weeks. I'm pro-choice, but I can't see how it can be considered okay to abort a fetus at 6 months when there has been cases of premature babies being born at this stage and surviving.

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They can survive, but not independently and still with a low survival rate (a week makes a big difference at that stage). First scans aren't normally done until 20 weeks (although this may be artificially pushed out in this country due to "ethos" of the hospitals). I don't see how you could logically have the cut off before the first scan which would show up issues in the baby or the mother? Any reduction must be mindful of the medical procedures that show up the problems.

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Originally Posted by crc

The BBC reported that there are 206,000 terminations per year in England and Wales. I had a quick look for the number of live births per year, which is around the 650,000 (for England & Wales). That means that about 24% of all pregnancies end in termination, which would strike me as extremely high no matter what side of the debate you are on.

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Don't forget that also includes terminations of countries like, say for example us. It's not really a fair comparison.

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Originally Posted by anto1208

Im against it, if i was ever in the situation i would definetly keep the baby i see very little reason to abort.

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Is anto short for Antoinette? I always thought you were a bloke tbh.

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Originally Posted by Macy

Don't forget that also includes terminations of countries like, say for example us. It's not really a fair comparison.

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I think my point is entirely fair. According to this website, 5,585 Irish women travelled to Britain in 2005, which represents a tiny proportion of the 206,000 figure quoted by the BBC. If you take out those with Irish addresses that still leaves a figure of 23%.

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Originally Posted by jebus

I was thinking the same watching the news yesterday, there is no way a politician on this island would touch this subject, let alone openly debate it, sad indictment of this island's rooted in Catholicism attitudes to be honest

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Yeah, despite the fact that the Supreme Court ruled in the X case that abortion is permitted in certain circumstances when there is a threat to the life of the mother, neither of the catholic centre-right parties in Ireland have legislated to put that judgment into law, leaving doctors in an extremely difficult legal position when this arises. Labour proposed legislating to take account of the X case judgment at the last general election but there's no way either FF or FG would have agreed to it so it was irrelevant really.

Whenever this has been discussed, most pro-choice groups who have dealt with numerous Irish women going to England for abortions say that a lot of those Irish women do not give their Irish address so the figures may be a lot higher than those simply based on Irish addresses.

On another point, it always surprises me how many of the most militant pro-life types are men though... :confused:

There should be a 24 year abortion limit. ASBOs my arse...

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Originally Posted by GavinZac

There should be a 24 year abortion limit. ASBOs my arse...

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It's good to have him back all the same :)

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Originally Posted by crc

I think my point is entirely fair. According to this website, 5,585 Irish women travelled to Britain in 2005, which represents a tiny proportion of the 206,000 figure quoted by the BBC. If you take out those with Irish addresses that still leaves a figure of 23%.

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That link also says that's an undercount though.

edit - as D13bohs points out

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Originally Posted by GavinZac

There should be a 24 year abortion limit. ASBOs my arse...

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disgraceful comment. Ban that man. He's asking for it, literally.

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Originally Posted by jebus

Yes but nature and circumstance will take its course if both parents die after a child has been born, both parents could die, but the baby might get picked up by the health services and go on to live, but thats all down to circumstance.

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For me there's an inherent contradiction in being pro choice and then pointing out how nature will take its course.

Now I begin to see how the likes of your fellow citizen the Minister for Guns gets such a huge personal vote. Obviously there's no problem with holding contradictory positions.

I think you should apply for a handle change to Dahamsta......*Janus would be much more appropriate than Jebus imho:p

(*The god of gates and doorways, depicted with two faces looking in opposite directions. )

Do I start by insulting his pro-life views, his Latte United support, or his anti-humour posts? Choices, choices

Lads, while I enjoy the witty banter as much as the next guy, can we leave it out of this thread and keep it as a straight debate please? It's an emotive issue and people WILL take jokes the wrong way. Usually on purpose, don't give them the opportunity.

THanks,
adam

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Originally Posted by superfrank

I'm pro-choice. I feel a foetus is not alive until it's out of the mother.

I'm well aware of the development of the foetus but I still think until the foetus comes out of the mother, it's not alive.

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Had to stop reading this thread when I came to the above post. Are you for REAL!!!

My wife is due in 8 days and I can feel the baby kicking etc etc, so its not ALIVE??? until it is born?

Its a person - a baby, get use to the terminology , I think an earlier post referred to the mother as the host :eek:

People need to get a little real and stop trying to sterilise the terminology, the process involves killing a baby in the mothers womb.

Scans happen at 12 weeks (if your private at least) and there is a little baby bobbing around clear a day.

Prochoice - so if the kid is one year old and the mother decides, nah can't live this life , can she book into a clinic and have the child disposed of? To me there is no difference no matter how you want to dress it up.

Abortion can be called whatever it wants but it is simply one individual deciding to take the life of another.

But hey its the politically correct world so if calling yourself Prochoice insulates you from the reality of baby killing - work away - free world.

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Originally Posted by SeanDrog

Its a person - a baby, get use to the terminology , I think an earlier post referred to the mother as the host :eek:

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In that case, the poster used the term 'host' because the reason the woman is having an abortion is because she doesn't want to be a mother, at least not to that foetus.

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Originally Posted by osarusan

In that case, the poster used the term 'host' because the reason the woman is having an abortion is because she doesn't want to be a mother, at least not to that foetus.

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While I see the point, plenty of mothers don't want to be mother's. If the child has been bron though you wouldnt call the mother 'the host' whether they want to be a mother or not.

I dont really see how being a mother is a choice. Maybe it depends on your definition of the word

At 12 weeks the foetus is basically an amphibian with all the intelligence, emotions and nervous system of a newt. It may have a head, 2 legs and 2 arms but a baby it aint. If you're strongly against its termination you're either a vegan or you attach some symbolic/mystic/religious value that makes what is essentially a parasite hiding itself by secreting hormones through the placenta, a potential human, and you start going down the murky road of souls and sins and that malarky

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Originally Posted by GavinZac

If you're strongly against its termination you're either a vegan or you attach some symbolic/mystic/religious value that makes what is essentially a parasite hiding itself by secreting hormones through the placenta, a potential human, and you start going down the murky road of souls and sins and that malarky

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Rubbish. If the foetus isnt terminated it will become a baby. It's the 'future' baby that people are against he termination of not the 'parasite'. It has nothing to do with sybolism or religion.

Sure kids arent much use to us, but if you let them grow into adults they will eventually contribute to society and carry on our genes..... :)

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Originally Posted by GavinZac

If you're strongly against its termination you're either a vegan or you attach some symbolic/mystic/religious value that makes what is essentially a parasite hiding itself by secreting hormones through the placenta, a potential human, and you start going down the murky road of souls and sins and that malarky

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Yet again Gavin, you assume that you know the character and motivation of people who have a certain opinion.

Didn't you receive a warning for that kind of thing recently?

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Originally Posted by GavinZac

At 12 weeks the foetus is basically an amphibian with all the intelligence, emotions and nervous system of a newt. It may have a head, 2 legs and 2 arms but a baby it aint. If you're strongly against its termination you're either a vegan or you attach some symbolic/mystic/religious value that makes what is essentially a parasite hiding itself by secreting hormones through the placenta, a potential human, and you start going down the murky road of souls and sins and that malarky

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What a sad world you live in.

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Originally Posted by micls

Rubbish. If the foetus isnt terminated it will become a baby. It's the 'future' baby that people are against he termination of not the 'parasite'. It has nothing to do with sybolism or religion.

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Isn't that the point though? They don't want it to become a baby, and it isn't a baby. Im sure some people would protest a 12 week abortion but be ok with a morning after pill. They both prevent future babies - the morning after pill stops the "parasite" from attaching itself. That makes it a hypocritical position; there has to be a point where we define what is 'human' and what is not. The idea that we would balk at the termination of a small squigly thing yet hunt/kill/experiment on gorillas and chimps with the mental capacity of a 3 year old or cows with the mental capacity of a 6 month old is again, hypocritical. If you're going to protect something which isn't human but might be some day, you have to ask why? What makes it special, now? And at what point does it become special? And what is the difference then, between special and not special? If the ability to someday have a human thought is the differentiating factor, we cannot differentiate at all once fertilisation has occurred in the fallopian tubes; one could go further and call a sperm racing toward an ovum collectively a potential human.

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Sure kids arent much use to us, but if you let them grow into adults they will eventually contribute to society and carry on our genes..... :)

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If ever there was a time for population control, it is now. As it is, we can barely sustain ourselves and food prices are rocketing. As Jared Diamond put it, if population continues to grow at the rate it is now, we'll be stacked on top of each other within 200 years and will have doubled the mass of the earth within 2000*.

With the age of genetic experimentation dawning it very much raises the issue of what we seek to protect and what we don't. We've already seen the ignorance that can exist when emotive issues cross genetic ones with the stem cell "controversy"; a day will come when someone identifies a gene that can be switched on or off and make a massive improvement to human quality of life; lactose intolerance, or susceptibility to cancer. One 'parasite' will have to be the first to be experimented on. Will people shout for joy because of the advances, or make sweeping hateful comments about souls, 'future humans' not having a choice, or eugenics?

*(based on reading Collapse about a year ago so figures might be off in either direction)

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Originally Posted by osarusan

Yet again Gavin, you assume that you know the character and motivation of people who have a certain opinion.

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What base have i not covered? Either they are against the unnecessary killing/abuse of living things, or they see the human foetus as special in some way. I can't think of any other reason but I'm open to correction.

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Didn't you receive a warning for that kind of thing recently?

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No? :confused:

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Originally Posted by GavinZac

Isn't that the point though? They don't want it to become a baby, and it isn't a baby. Im sure some people would protest a 12 week abortion but be ok with a morning after pill. They both prevent future babies - the morning after pill stops the "parasite" from attaching itself. That makes it a hypocritical position; there has to be a point where we define what is 'human' and what is not. The idea that we would balk at the termination of a small squigly thing yet hunt/kill/experiment on gorillas and chimps with the mental capacity of a 3 year old or cows with the mental capacity of a 6 month old is again, hypocritical. If you're going to protect something which isn't human but might be some day, you have to ask why? What makes it special, now? And at what point does it become special? And what is the difference then, between special and not special? If the ability to someday have a human thought is the differentiating factor, we cannot differentiate at all.

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That gets a big hear hear from Jebus

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Originally Posted by GavinZac

No? :confused:

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Apologies, I was wrong (on that part only).

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Originally Posted by GavinZac

Isn't that the point though? They don't want it to become a baby, and it isn't a baby. Im sure some people would protest a 12 week abortion but be ok with a morning after pill. They both prevent future babies - the morning after pill stops the "parasite" from attaching itself. That makes it a hypocritical position; there has to be a point where we define what is 'human' and what is not. The idea that we would balk at the termination of a small squigly thing yet hunt/kill/experiment on gorillas and chimps with the mental capacity of a 3 year old or cows with the mental capacity of a 6 month old is again, hypocritical. If you're going to protect something which isn't human but might be some day, you have to ask why? What makes it special, now? And at what point does it become special? And what is the difference then, between special and not special? If the ability to someday have a human thought is the differentiating factor, we cannot differentiate at all once fertilisation has occurred in the fallopian tubes; one could go further and call a sperm racing toward an ovum collectively a potential human.

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I agree with every word of this though.

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Originally Posted by osarusan

Apologies, I was wrong (on that part only).

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Well correct me then! Tell me what possiblity I left out and therefore made assumptions on someones character?

Edit: If I have/do offended anyone, I do apologise. There is obviously emotional issues here, and we're dealing with science that isn't complete; no-one really knows if a third trimester has ever had a thought, consensus has not been reached on the comparability of human, primate and general mammal emotion. I find the easiest way to talk is in terms of the science that we do know; I am not some cold borderline psychopath who sees no value in potential human life. However, when you try to take something which is entirely a grey area, you need to find some sort of delineation to speak in terms of legal and illegal, right and wrong. Abortions and genetic experimentation and our own value of what is human, what is not and what the difference is anyway, are the single greatest philosophical and moral challenges faces us as we move into an era where creation moves from a mystic power to the manipulation of proteins. I don't claim to hold the definitive answer and 3 years ago I probably would have argued an entirely different position.

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Originally Posted by GavinZac

Isn't that the point though? They don't want it to become a baby, and it isn't a baby. Im sure some people would protest a 12 week abortion but be ok with a morning after pill. They both prevent future babies - the morning after pill stops the "parasite" from attaching itself.

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Not necessarily. Sperm can live up to 3 days in the womb, the egg may not be fertalised when the morning after pill is taken. What it stops in that case is the fertilisation.

With the morning after pill, there is a chance fertilisation may have happened, yes, but there are also the chances that it hasnt. You are stopping the possibility. If there were a pill that only stop fertilisation, not fertilised eggs(after the event) then I would advocate that, bt there isnt.

With termination, there is a fertilised egg that more than likely will become a baby. The same cannot be said for the morning after pill

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Originally Posted by micls

Not necessarily. Sperm can live up to 3 days in the womb, the egg may not be fertalised when the morning after pill is taken. What it stops in that case is the fertilisation.

With the morning after pill, there is a chance fertilisation may have happened, yes, but there are also the chances that it hasnt. You are stopping the possibility. If there were a pill that only stop fertilisation, not fertilised eggs(after the event) then I would advocate that, bt there isnt.

With termination, there is a fertilised egg that more than likely will become a baby. The same cannot be said for the morning after pill

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The same can be said :confused: It may kill sperm, but it also kills fertilised eggs that more than likely will become a baby. Pills do exist that stops fertilisation, and there are gels and such that kill sperm. They aren't popular and aren't commercially viable because people are buying it for both effects.
If you're against termination simply because it might one day be a human, but ok with the combined effects of the morning after pill, its a hypocritical stance. The differentiating line that you use between right and wrong then shifts to be based on something else, something entirely less material than whether the egg is fertilised or not.

Can everyone calm down so I don't have to close this thread.

The UK 24 week law is based medical evidence that fetus cannot survive outside the womb pre 24 weeks. The argument not to change to 20 or 22 weeks was because they received no new medical evidence. Thats the facts of the UK debate no matter which side you are on.

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Originally Posted by pete

Can everyone calm down so I don't have to close this thread.

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It has gone off-topic alright, but nobody's angry Pete, as far as I can see.

SeanDrog, and others, you need to calm down and drop the emotive and/or abusive language or the thread is going to be locked, as pete says. People are entitled to their beliefs just like you're entitled to ours, and if you want to rebut them you have to do them calmly and with facts. If you can't do that, you're not welcome in the Current Affairs forum in particular.

adam