Pro-Life Times: January 2003

Ireland In Abortion Funding Scandal

Dana challenges Irish government funding for population control

by Anthony Ozimic

It has been revealed that the Irish government is funding the world's leading promoters of abortion, both directly and through the European Union (EU).

Irish Minister of State for foreign affairs Tom Kitt announced that the Irish government's contribution to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) in the coming year would be at least 1.84 million Euros. Last year, the United States cut off funding from UNFPA because of UNFPA's involvement in China's policy of population control by forced abortion. The European Commission has also announced millions in new EU funding for UNFPA and for abortion lobbyists the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF).

The Irish government is set to back a European Parliament proposal for abortion funding that would be binding on all EU member-states, including Ireland.

"This is a disgraceful misuse of our money. The use of Irish taxpayers' money to provide abortion services is unconstitutional", said leading Irish pro-life politician Dana Rosemary Scallon MEP. "Our constitutional position is that the life and dignity of all human beings, whatever their stage of development and state of health, must be respected."

Dana also pointed out that Irish and EU funding of abortion violates an agreement signed by Ireland and the EU in Cairo in 1994, which said that population programmes must be "consistent with national laws" and have "full respect for the various religious ethical values" of different countries.

Pat Buckley of the Catholic Family & Human Rights Institute (C-Fam), Europe, echoed Dana's outrage, saying: "As a nation which suffered major depletion of its population during the famine, for Ireland to pay for abortion and population control policies to be exported to the third world would be to defile our collective national conscience."

Comment

Rev Steven Foster

One of the biggest pro-life projects I have been involved with was the SPUC Evangelicals book "Love Your Unborn Neighbour". One reviewer criticised it for not laying out the arguments in an even-handed way. Sadly, she is typical of many people: they look for discussion about life issues, but never progress beyond that.

This is a challenge to us in the pro-life movement. We need to present our case clearly and convincingly, but that is just the start. Can we convince people that killing unborn children is not only wrong but requires active opposition in the same way as slavery or the Nazi liquidation of the Jews did in the past? The critical move is from the armchair of debate to the arena of commitment and action.

The Bible commends those who act on the truth: "Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them", said Jesus (John 13:17).

In the end, we shall have to answer to God not on whether we debated 'the abortion issue', but on whether we acted to protect innocent unborn children.
Lord God, when we look into the mirror of your word, help us to act on what you show us there. Amen.
Steven Foster is the Chairman of SPUC Evangelicals. He is a Church of England vicar. Steven and his wife, Yvonne, have been members of SPUC for twenty years. They have five children.

The great pro-life task ahead

by John Smeaton

After 35 years of legalised abortion we have to face the reality that very many people in the communities in which we live think differently from us about various issues which are absolutely fundamental to the pro-life cause. Let me explain.

Last August my wife and I took a short holiday in Somerset, staying in our favourite family haunt. We were befriended by a lovely old lady, who came from Ireland, like my wife. One evening we went out with her to dinner. We chatted about family, children, and grandchildren and she mentioned in passing, just casually and without any sign of regret, that her much loved grandchildren were conceived by IVF.

It brought home to me that right in the heart of our own communities, maybe right in the heart of our families, we know good people who either don't understand the facts about IVF or who choose to put it at the back of their minds: that for every baby born, there are 24 babies who are either discarded or frozen, or who die during pregnancy, or who fail to survive the freeze/thaw process (Pro-Life Times, October 2002).

Moreover, right in the heart of our communities, maybe right in the heart of our families, we know good people who would accept, perhaps without really thinking or knowing, one form or another of abortifacient birth control.

If this is true of our own communities, how much more true it is of the wider community whose hearts and minds we have to change if we plan to change the law of the land.

So we have a lot of work to do to change the thinking of our friends, our neighbours and our family members, as well as to change the thinking of the wider community about these fundamental issues.

Our task is not impossible. We can and we will build a culture of life. Please join us now. Find out more about our campaign from me on johnsmeaton@spuc.org.uk or by telephoning SPUC on 020 7222 5845.

Schoolgirl abortion tragedy

by Antonia Tully

Reports in the Birmingham "Evening Mail" revealed that a West Midlands child as young as nine had an abortion. This followed earlier reports that the abortifacient morning-after pill would be made available to youngsters as young as nine in youth clubs in the region.

Local British Pregnancy Advisory Service spokesman Ian Jones responded to the nine year old's case by saying, "In our experience offering contraception services does not encourage girls. For the majority it's probably a more positive experience for them to have a termination than to go to full term."

The Calthorpe Clinic in Edgbaston, Birmingham stated that it performed abortions on girls as young as 11. Spokeswoman Tracey Allsopp of the clinic said, "Sex happens and emotions run high which means that emergency contraception should be made available".

A spokesman for SPUC said, "Despite increasing the availability of the abortifacient morning-after pill, registered abortions in Britain each year on girls under 16 have risen by 16% over the last decade. This is proof that the policy of providing morning-after pills to children does not work."

New book shows the humanity of unborn baby

by Staff Reporter

A new book, "From Conception to Birth", illustrates the development of the unborn life in nearly three hundred pages of remarkable pictures.

Computer scientists have developed three dimensional techniques for scanning and displaying the human body, which can isolate systems - nervous, skeletal, circulatory and so on. Photographer Alexander Tsiaras has combined these powerful medical imaging techniques with computer software to view different organs inside an unborn baby's body.

The book is targeted at expectant parents wanting to follow the growth of their unborn baby. For the pro-life community this book is a powerful witness to the humanity of the unborn child. The pictures and text relating to the very early embryo show the tremendous activity that takes place in the first month of life, where the pro-life campaign is increasingly focused.

According to the publishers none of the babies photographed was from elective abortions.

Highest ever number of state-funded abortions

by Sam Forsdike

Official abortion figures for England and Wales show the number of abortions funded by the State last year was the highest ever at 134,705. Despite excluding "hidden abortions" caused by abortifacient birth control drugs and devices, figures still show the third highest total ever (186,274) for registered abortions.

Paul Tully, SPUC general secretary, commented, "These figures demonstrate a systematic attack on human life that has intensified since the 1967 Abortion Act. Successive governments have taken no effective action to tackle this loss of life on a vast scale."

News in Brief

· Peru - Peru has turned down a five-year $24 million bilateral development assistance grant from the UK because it was intended to develop so-called reproductive health services - usually understood to include abortion and abortifacient methods of birth control.

· USA - The Knights of St Columba, America's largest lay Catholic organisation, urged all US Catholics to vote for pro-life candidates during the elections in November last year. Pro-life candidates enjoyed success not only in elections for the congress but also in elections for state legislatures and governorships. The National Right to Life Committee in the US welcomed the Republican victory in the Congress. Republicans are generally more pro-life than Democrats and a Republican majority will make it easier for pro-life legislation to succeed.

· UK - SPUC has expressed concern over the latest population figures which reveal that there are now more over-60s than under 16s for the first time among the UK population. A spokesman for SPUC said, "The promotion of abortion by both private and public agencies, and with massive public funding, has been a major factor in this."

· UK - A row broke out, last year at the Royal Victoria Infirmary in Newcastle when a consultant proposed aborting a twin boy in the final weeks of pregnancy. The boy had a heart defect which the consultant considered inoperable. However other specialists believed the abortion would have disastrous psychological effects and that the boy had a good chance of leading a normal life.

Teenage pregnancies: why we are failing

As SPUC intensifies its campaign against the abortion-inducing morning-after pill, challenging the policy of targeting teenage girls, including those under the age of 16, remains a central concern. Many people find it hard to understand why giving teenage girls more and more access to contraceptives, surgical abortions and the morning-after pill, has not led to a reduction in teenage pregnancies. Dr David Paton of Nottingham University looks at how current policies are failing.

Teenage pregnancy and abortion rates in the UK are amongst the highest in the developed world and the Government has vowed to reduce conception rates amongst under 18s by 50% by 2010. Showing a singular lack of imagination, the Government's Teenage Pregnancy Strategy is concentrating on increasing young people's access to confidential (i.e. without parental knowledge) family planning services. Amongst the most controversial measures are that all young pregnant women should have early access to NHS-funded abortions and that youngsters under the age of 16 should have access to the morning-after pill at supermarkets and at schools.

For many people, family planning is an obvious solution. If more youngsters who are having sex used contraception, then surely we would have fewer pregnancies. In fact, you may be surprised to learn that the majority of youngsters who get pregnant were using some form of contraception already; they became pregnant because the contraception failed.1
In order to understand the factors that really contribute to teenage pregnancy, we need to ask: why is it that some youngsters decide to have sex and others don't? For some it may be peer pressure, for others the influence of drink or perhaps just curiosity. One of the biggest factors in the decision is the youngster's attitude to pregnancy. Some teenagers actively want to get pregnant, and providing family planning is unlikely to change anything for this group. Other youngsters are keen to avoid pregnancy. Providing family planning makes these youngsters believe they are less likely to get pregnant and, as a result, more of them are likely to have sex. We are sometimes told, "Young people are going to have sex anyway - nothing will change that". Well, think about the following scenario. Say 100 youngsters have decided to have sex. Now say we were to remove all access to any form of family planning. Would all 100 still decide to have sex? Of course not! Those who want to get pregnant will still have sex. Some of the others will too, perhaps due to ignorance or peer pressure. However, at least some of those who are really keen to avoid pregnancy will now decide to abstain from sex.

The bottom line is that providing family planning in schools is likely to have two effects. Those girls who would have had sex anyway are less likely to get pregnant because they have greater access to contraceptives. However, the number of pregnacies among those girls who start to have sex as a result of providing family planning is likely to increase, because if they weren't having sex at all they wouldn't get pregnant. We can only judge the overall effect by looking at the evidence. In fact, my research, recently published in the Journal of Health Economics, shows that increasing access to family planning for youngsters simply has not reduced teenage pregnancy rates.2 Many other papers have come to a similar conclusion. In the case of the morning-after pill, a study published in the British Medical Journal found that youngsters who were prescribed the morning-after pill were more likely to go on to have abortions at a later stage.3 Rather worryingly, little or no research has examined the impact of these types of policies on rates of sexually transmitted diseases.

There are two possible ways to interpret the finding that family planning has not reduced teenage pregnancies. One is that access to family planning removes a restraint on those teenagers who would otherwise not engage in sex. The other interpretation is that access to family planning has no effect on youngsters' behaviour at all. Either way, it seems very unlikely that recent proposals to provide condoms and the morning-after pill to youngsters at school without their parents knowing will help in reducing teenage pregnancies.

If you think you've heard this somewhere before, then you probably have. In 1992, the last Conservative Government announced its intention to increase access to family planning with the aim of reducing teenage pregnancies amongst under 16s by 50% by the year 2000. What was the result? Well, attendance by under 16s at family planning clinics rose by 143.6% between 1992 and 2000. Prescriptions of the morning-after pill to this age group at family planning clinics rose by 284.8%. Over the same period, the conception rate amongst under 16s went down from 8.4 per 1000 girls in 1992 to 8.3 per 1000 in 2000!

The myth that providing family planning and the morning-after pill for under 16s without parental knowledge is an easy way to reduce teenage pregnancy should be challenged at every opportunity. Our children deserve something better than an out-of-date approach that simply doesn't work.
  1. Churchill, D. et al (2000), 'Consultation Patterns and Provision of Contraception in General Practice Before Teenage Pregnancy: case-control study', British Medical Journal, 2, 1, 486-9.
  2. Paton, David (2002), 'The Economics of Family Planning and Underage Conceptions', Journal of Health Economics, 21, 2 (March), 27-45.
  3. Churchill et al op. cit.

From the desk of Joanna Bogle

CHOOSE LIFE! RALLY IN LONDON Sunday, June 29th 2003, is the day chosen for a London rally on the theme, Choose Life! This message with its positive call for a fresh look at our whole society will be echoed in speeches, songs, and a walk of witness through Westminster. All the main pro-life organisations in Britain are backing this event. Be there! The planning committee is now busy. It needs, of course, help and funds. Write to: Choose Life, 27 Walpole Street London SW3.

GLASGOW'S PRO-LIFE INITIATIVE

Good news in Glasgow: Sister Roseanne Reddy and her team at the Pro-Life Initiative are doing well. The first babies they helped to save from abortion have just started school! Sister Roseanne has prayer-cards, leaflets, ideas for practical action and moving testimonies from mothers who have been helped to reject abortion and save their babies. "The worry that was lifted from my shoulders was incredible". "I will always be grateful". "Although it took me some time to pluck up courage to make the phone call, within a week of having done so my life began to change. My daughter is my life." A brochure inviting help for the Initiative suggests all sorts of ways: prayer, fasting, fund-raising, witnessing to the pro-life vision at work, home and school. I particularly like its message to young people - to live chastely and honestly, showing respect for all. Contact the Initiative at 0141 433 2680.

TIMELY ...

A thoughtful article in an American pro-life journal argues that today's pro-life battle is not only legal or political, but cultural too. There have been a number of films and TV programmes (remember "Cider House Rules"?) promoting the idea that supporters of abortion are kindly, moral and decent while pro-life campaigners are crude, harsh and bigoted . It is too easy for the pro-life message to be caricatured, but we need to examine our style and approach all the time. Do our ideas about respect, compassion, solidarity and hope come across whenever we are working to promote our cause? In the way we behave and speak, the literature we hand out, the banners we hold? Are we getting it right? Above all, we need books, plays, and films that show insights into the real issues facing our society: any publisher or producers out there who could help? Imagine a TV soap, a gripping play, some sensitive fiction, that could tackle some pro-life issues.. (Copy of the American article available from me: send SAE to me at Pro-Life Times).

PRO-LIFE ISSUES AT THE UN

At the United Nations, programmes for population-control, the morning-after pill, and imposition of abortion on the poorest countries in the world, are all on the agenda. Pro-life workers and lobbyists at the UN have faced great struggles. It has been a help to have the presence of the Catholic Church. There is now a concerted campaign to make it harder for the Church to be active as permanent observer status for the Holy See has been challenged. We need to understand the issues involved here. An essay competition sponsored by a Catholic writers' group invites young people to explore all this: send SAE to The Keys, 34 Barnard Gardens, New Malden, KT3 6QG for details.

SPUC condemns overseas aid policy

£260 million to population control while millions lack clean water

by Staff Reporter

The Society for the Protection of Unborn Children has condemned the British government's overseas aid programme to other governments in 2001/02, for giving £260 million "for reproductive health services," which include abortion, sterilisation and contraception, with only £78.8 million going to safe drinking water and sanitation. These figures were revealed in a report published by the Department for International Development (DFID).

SPUC political spokesman, Anthony Ozimic, said, "It is outrageous that almost 3 1/4 as much taxpayers' money is spent on curbing women's fertility as on safe water and sanitation. Millions of people, often in desperate circumstances, lack access to clean water. The British public should be aware of where their money is going."

The 2002 World Bank Atlas states that 25% of the Chinese population lack access to a source of safe water, whereas 83% of women of childbearing age have access to contraception. In Vietnam, 44% of people do not have access to safe water, while 75% of women of childbearing age have access to contraception.

Britain faces up to China's one-child policy

by Anthony Ozimic

For the first time, the British Foreign Office has addressed the gross violations of human rights committed under China's one-child policy.

Following criticism by the House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee and pressure from the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children, the Foreign Office has included a section on the one-child policy in its Human Rights Annual Report (2002 edition). The report speaks about "concerns...such as enforced sterilisations, the abortion of female foetuses and the abandonment of female children", noting that these "are also a source of concern for many Chinese people."

Paul Tully, SPUC general secretary commented: "The wall of silence with which the Foreign Office surrounded forced abortion in China has been broken. The Foreign Office has realised that the British public will no longer accept the blind eye that the West has often turned to China's continuing persecution of pregnant women."

Belgium legalises euthanasia

by Sam Forsdike

Belgium has become the second European country, after the Netherlands, to legalise euthanasia. Under this law, doctors can legally kill patients as long as they are "of age and conscious", "have requested euthanasia freely and consistently, are in a "terminal medical condition" and are enduring "constant and unbearable physical or psychological pain".

However, the first official death has provoked outcry amidst accusations that it was simply a publicity stunt. Mario Verstraete, a 39-year-old sufferer from multiple sclerosis, died from a lethal injection on 30 September, only a week after the new law came into effect. Belgium's professional medical organisation is considering whether to take legal action over the case after complaining that the killing was illegal. Under the law a patient must request euthanasia at least a month before the killing takes place, and a second opinion must be sought if the patient is not in the final stages of a terminal illness.

Dr Philippe Schepens, the Belgian secretary general of the World Federation of Doctors Who Respect Human Life said, "It was a very sad day for Belgium when euthanasia was legalised. The Belgian euthanasia law doesn't say one must be in a terminal condition, but that the person must be in a hopeless condition. Our Belgian law is worse than the Dutch law, because a hopeless condition is very subjective."

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