Iceland Kills Almost 100% of Babies With Down Syndrome in Abortion, Denmark 98%, UK 90%, and U.S. 74%

Iceland Kills Almost 100% of Babies With Down Syndrome in Abortion, Denmark 98%, UK 90%, and U.S. 74%

A powerful video, The Hiring Chain, produced for 2021 World Down Syndrome Day (March 21), features a wonderful song that describes a life-affirming chain reaction kicked off when a baker hires a young woman with Down syndrome.

The Hiring Chain, written by the team at CoorDown, an Italian advocacy organization that promotes acceptance and inclusion of people with Down syndrome, is performed by the world renowned rock star, Sting.

Employees with Down syndrome are shown in the video being hired, all as a consequence of the initial job offer from the Baker. We hear these lyrics, sung by Sting to a catchy tune:

The Baker hired Simone
And everybody saw
That she could do the job.
The Lawyer went to the Baker
And saw Simone at work.
The Lawyer hired John
Because the Baker hired Simone…

And so on, until it comes full circle.

This scenario is a perfect example of how vital it is for people with Down syndrome to be seen and encountered in our world. The more they are known, the more we benefit from their presence and the more we appreciate their unique gifts.  And the more they are known, the more they are accepted and the more they benefit from our understanding. You might call it the Circle of Acceptance.

But to be known, they must first be born!

Tragically, abortion takes the lives of thousands of unborn babies with Down syndrome each year.  A 2012 study estimates that about 74 percent of babies prenatally diagnosed with Down syndrome in the U.S. are aborted.  In Europe, the abortion rate is even higher– 90 percent in the U.K., 98 percent in Denmark, and for all practical purposes 100 percent in Iceland. 

We must understand, however, that the positive chain reaction, unleashed by our increased exposure to individuals with Down syndrome, beautifully demonstrated in the CoorDown video, can be set off in the opposite direction when our exposure is decreased.

In other words, the fewer of us who know someone with Down syndrome, the fewer of us will be touched by their unique gifts, and the fewer of us who will understand and appreciate them. The fewer of us that understand and appreciate them, the worse off it will be for those who have Down syndrome.  In fact, this lack of understanding can, and has led to intolerance toward people with Down syndrome, lethally so when they are at their most vulnerable—in the womb.

Unfortunately, for a myriad of reasons, too many of us may harbor preconceived notions about Down syndrome.

Perhaps, it is because individuals with Down syndrome share common physical features that make their appearance a bit different than those of us who lack that extra 21st chromosome.  Or maybe because there is always some level of intellectual disability, we assume that it means they cannot understand or learn or perform a job.

But when we are fortunate enough to have someone with Down syndrome in our families, friend circles, and/or communities, prejudices and biases and stereotypes are challenged. We come to learn there is more to them than meets the eye.  We come to appreciate their oftentimes delightful humor, love of people, and ability to perform their jobs well.

Ask any parent of a child born with Down syndrome, and most will tell you that, yes, they initially experienced sadness and fear.  However, overwhelmingly, most of those parents will also tell you that their children transformed their sadness into joy and changed their lives for the better.

Emily, a family friend of ours beautifully expressed this reality some years ago when writing about our daughter in a school essay. “With Sadie, I learned first-hand that oftentimes disabled children have the sweetest souls.  It is impossible to explain exactly how I learned this. It is a type of knowledge that cannot be passed on by any amount of words, you must learn through experience to fully understand.”

Emily hit the nail on the head!

On CoorDown’s YouTube channel, they write, “By hiring someone with Down syndrome, you start a virtuous chain: the more that people with Down Syndrome are seen at work, the more they’ll be recognized as valuable employees, and the more they’ll be hired. Do your part, start the Hiring Chain today.”

Of course, and more importantly, the same could also be said for bringing a baby with Down syndrome into this world.  By one mother choosing Life for her baby, another will also choose Life.  And the more babies with Down syndrome born, the more we all benefit from their lives, and the more individuals with Down syndrome will benefit as well.  It is a win-win.  Start the Hiring Chain!

Do yourself a favor and watch the delightful The Hiring Chain video.

LifeNews Note: Eileen Haupt is the mother of a lovely 22-year-old daughter with Down syndrome and co-founder of Keep Infants with Down Syndrome (KIDS)

 

Ref: This is a www.lifenews.com opinion piece

https://www.lifenews.com/2021/03/29/iceland-kills-almost-100-of-babies-with-down-syndrome-in-abortion-denmark-98-uk-90-and-u-s-74 

Abortion – Womb or Tomb? – Giovanni Bonello

Abortion – womb or tomb? – Giovanni Bonello

The University Għaqda Studenti tal-Liġi has come out strongly in favour of decriminalisation of abortion in Malta. No one disputes their fundamental right to hold and spread opinions, all the more so when the opinions are necessarily subjective and often more emotionally than rationally based. Perhaps they could have been more cautious where angels fear to tread.

I propose to deal briefly with some current legal misconceptions, avoiding as much as possible the equally relevant minefields of science, ethics, cultural traditions and religious belief.

So, exclusively law, and starting with fundamental law. It is often repeated that a woman’s right to abortion is her fundamental human right. Is it? Who says so?

In Europe there is an empirical but universally accepted standard as to what is a fundamental human right and what is not. In brief, fundamental human rights are only those which the European Court of Human Rights says are fundamental human rights (though domestic law is entitled to add to the list).

Now, in its 61 years existence and its tens of thousands of judgments, a number of which dealt specifically with abortion-related issues, not once, repeat, not once has the supreme court of Europe qualified abortion as a human right.

The closest it came was to rule that, if domestic legislation allowed abortion, then it would be a violation of a women’s rights to deny her, directly or indirectly, that option. Never has the supreme court of Europe ruled that a state must legalise abortion. Every sovereign state remains free to legalise abortion, to decriminalise it in given circumstances or to criminalise it.

A second legal misconception: rights only begin at birth. Not quite so. Our law deems a woman, whether one week or nine months pregnant, as a “woman with child”.

A look at current Maltese law dismisses the fable that a foetus is merely “a clump of cells”, the same way a beauty-spot, a bunion or a blister is. Not at all. The very words of the Criminal Code negate this.

Abortion, according to the code (Article 241), occurs when anyone causes the miscarriage of “a woman with child”. Not the miscarriage of “a woman with a clump of cells”. A foetus, however early, is by Maltese law considered to be a child, with some of the rights and the expectations of a child – among them, the right not to be quashed before birth.

This the Criminal Code repeats in the notion of grievous bodily harm. The law qualifies a harm as grievous when, if “committed on a woman with child, it causes miscarriage” (Article 218). A harm is not grievous if committed on a woman with “a clump of cells”. It escalates in gravity when a woman is “with child”.

Maltese law dismisses the fable that a foetus is merely “a clump of cells”. Above is an illustration of an early-stage embryo. Photo: Sciepro/Shutterstock.comWhen protecting the right to life, for the purposes of establishing criminal guilt, Maltese law does not differentiate between a foetus and a born child. It safeguards them equally, however early the pregnancy. There is only a difference in the punishment, not in the criminal guilt.

Though not specified in the written law of procedure, in practice our traditional system of protection under the law has adopted the institute of ‘curator of the womb’ known by its old-style name of curatore al ventre. When a pregnant married woman is widowed, the court may, at the request of any interested person, appoint a curator to safeguard the interests of the unborn child.

The court does not appoint a curator to defend the expectations of a clump of cells but to protect an unborn being deemed to be holder of potential or actual rights.

And, before capital punishment was abolished in Malta in 2000, it was official government policy to commute the death penalty of any woman who was pregnant at the time of sentencing or of execution. Did the state care about not sending to death a woman with a clump of cells, or was it concerned with not terminating the autonomous life of a separate being who had not been convicted of any crime?

On the horns of a dilemma, the state preferred that a guilty pregnant woman should escape just retribution, rather than that an innocent foetus should have his or her life terminated. I am now being told that the state was not choosing between justice, on one hand, and an unborn child on the other. Oh no, the state was officially opting for injustice to society in order to save… a clump of cells.

In prohibiting the execution of pregnant women, Malta was following the principle now enshrined in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights: “Sentence of death shall not be carried out on pregnant women” (Article 6). The life of a criminal mother is spared, obviously not to upset a clump of cells.

I understand that a purely ‘legal’ configuration of the abortion narrative informs only a part of the debate and that powerful arguments militate on either side of the fence. But it is simplistic to reduce complex and contentious issues to black or white.

There is excellent material in this Position Paper, though it is massively one-sided in problems so seeped in controversy. I wished the Għaqda Studenti tal-Liġi, whose function it is to promote the study of law, had been more balanced and nuanced.

Giovanni Bonello, ex-judge at the European Court of Human Rights

 

This is www.timesofmalta.com opinion piece

Ref: https://timesofmalta.com/articles/view/abortion-womb-or-tomb-giovanni-bonello.841637

An ominous resolution – Tonio Borg

An ominous resolution – Tonio Borg

The EU cannot interfere on matters such as abortion

Poland was recently at loggerheads with the European Union. It was objecting to a new mechanism which permitted the withdrawal of EU funds to countries that do not abide by the rule of law.

Thankfully, Poland finally yielded and now the mechanism, with certain safeguards, will be launched. A country cannot abuse of its sovereignty in rule of law matters while belonging to the Union, benefitting from its membership but ignoring its values.

This mechanism could be a lifesaver for any country whose government tries to cross the red lines of what it is allowed to do.

What is, however, perturbing is that in the midst of this crisis, the European Parliament passed a controversial, even though non-binding, resolution which condemned Poland because its Constitutional Court has ruled that the right to life protects even unborn children who are physically or mentally deformed or disabled.

The charge against Poland was that “many pregnant women who have been informed that there is a high probability of the foetus having a severe and irreversible abnormality or an incurable disease have had their access to legal abortion restricted”.

It then “strongly condemned the Constitutional Tribunal’s ruling and the setback to women’s sexual and reproductive rights in Poland”. It also affirmed that “the ruling puts women’s health and lives at risk”. It even assumed that wilful termination of a pregnancy is a fundamental right although no European instrument of law recognises such right.

This resolution, even though not binding, is astounding. Since when is the apex court of an EU member state subject to criticism for its judgments on matters which are outside the powers and jurisdiction of the EU organs such as abortion?

In fact, European commissioners have repeatedly made it clear that, according to the principle of subsidiarity, abortion and euthanasia are matters to be dealt with by the member states themselves. Some allow them. Others, like Poland and Malta, are vehemently against.

The government cannot cajole the Catholic vote on the one hand and allow its pundits and MEPs to encourage the introduction of abortion in Malta– Tonio Borg

This intrusion on the subsidiarity principle and the margin of appreciation, which each member state enjoys in such matters, was conveniently forgotten by the European Parliament. It is appropriate to recall that, during the negotiations leading to Malta’s accession to the Union, the Fenech Adami government had managed to include a protocol in the Treaty of Accession to the effect that, even though the current legal position is that the EU cannot interfere in such matters as abortion, Malta retained the right that, should the rules change, it remains the arbiter to decide whether to introduce the wilful termination of a woman’ pregnancy in Maltese law.

Now for the rules to change, one needs the unanimous decision of the member states. Yet, to be doubly sure, a Nationalist government insisted on including such a protocol.

It is sad to note that out of six Maltese MEPs, only two, namely Nationalist MEPs Roberta Metsola and David Casa, voted against the EP resolution. Even though the official position of the current Labour government, as expressed by the prime minister, is that the current administration is against the introduction of abortion, two Labour MEPs, in Pilate-like fashion, washed their hands of the issue and actually abstained on a resolution condemning a country for restricting abortion.

Another Labour MEP did not turn up for the vote. But, worse than that, one Labour MEP, Cyrus Engerer, voted in favour. In his considered opinion, the selection of healthy unborn children and the elimination of the unhealthy ones in their mother’ womb could actually be even considered as a human right, an evil that could be one day be taken as laudable and morally right.

He stated that “the ruling of October 22 by Poland’s Constitutional Tribunal to make abortion illegal in cases involving severe and irreversible foetal defects “puts women’s health and lives at risk”, 

Besides, the inertia, and, in one case, the outright approval, regarding the resolution by Labour MEPs has created a dangerous precedent for Malta whose laws are in line with the ruling of the Polish Constitutional Court.

We inevitably shudder when we read about the extermination of disabled, deformed or abnormal human beings during the last World War by totalitarian regimes in pursuit of the superior race doctrine.  Still, it seems that some of us find nothing objectionable if such human beings are exterminated before they are born. They style themselves pro-choice but the only persons who have no choice at all are the unborn.

This is similar to a recent boast by one member state that practically there were no longer any children born with Down Syndrome in its territory, not because a cure was found for such condition but because all unborn children showing signs of such condition were eliminated before having the chance of being born!

It is useless paying only lip service to the right to life. The right to life needs to be defended every day. The government cannot cajole the Catholic vote on the one hand and allow its pundits and MEPs to encourage the introduction of abortion in Malta.

Tonio Borg is former European Commissioner.

 

Ref: This is a timesofmalta.com opinion piece

https://timesofmalta.com/articles/view/an-ominous-resolution-tonio-borg.839705#.X977ob14ooQ.whatsapp

Leaving the sex field blank – Tonio Fenech

Leaving the sex field blank – Tonio Fenech

I am caught between two minds pondering on a proposal announced by the government in Bill 170, clause 22, which allows parents to leave the sex field blank on the birth registration when the gender of the child is unclear.

Presented as an important change, what is unclear to me is whether the “undeclared” classification will be applied when, biologically, the sex of the child is in doubt, as in the case of intersex, or whether parents will be allowed to leave it empty even when the sex of the child is clear.

The intersex case

I am not professionally competent to say if this will help intersex people but I tried to understand the challenges faced by these people before forming an opinion.

Intersex is a biological reality that affects between 0.05 per cent and 0.7 per cent of children, according to the UN Human Rights office. It is when a child is born with variations in sex characteristics, including chromosomes, gonads, sex hormones or genitals that do not fit the typical definitions for male or female bodies. 

Mauro Cabral, for Global Action for Trans Equality (GATE), an intersex person himself, during the Intersex Awareness Day of 2016 stated that “intersex people are not a natural third sex, we don’t have a third gender by definition, and leaving a blank sex assignment at birth is not the way to ‘create justice’ for us. We need to stop approaching intersex issues as if they were trans issues.

“Some trans people use intersex as a way of explaining who they are or to make sense of their bodies or identities. By doing this, intersex becomes just another way of saying trans. However, intersex is not about being trans, queer or non-binary: it’s about bodies and what happens to people who are born with them. We need to stop instrumentalising intersex to speak our truth as trans people”. 

What Cabral proposed was to dismantle binary ideas about bodies and body shaming.  

While I would join an initiative to fight body shaming, I cannot agree that in order to solve the challenges of intersex people we need to also deny human nature and the remaining 99.3 per cent labelled ‘binary’. Male and female are not an offence to intersex people, as people with eyesight are not offensive to the visually impaired.  We are simply born different; solutions should focus on inclusion, not elimination of who the rest are.

(Trans) gender ideology

A recent article in Times of Malta, ‘Will children choose their gender now?’ (November 30), defended this amendment as it fosters “a wider acceptance of gender fluidity and/or non-heteronormative sexuality in local culture”, assuring readers that this amendment is harmless since “if a child is assigned a gender at birth they may later choose to change when they become an adult”; consequently, we should not find it difficult to allow parents to leave the sex identification blank.  

Frankly, I find this argument twisted because an adult changing his or her gender classification is no justification for leaving a child genderless until adult age.

I do not think anyone’s children should become a social experiment called ‘gender fluidity’

The gender fluidity theory suggests that gender is not fixed and, basically, today I may feel a man, tomorrow a woman and the week after a man again and so we should use neutral pronouns and classifications to allow for this fluidity.

The Times of Malta article tries to support the theory by quoting the American Psychological Association that defines sex as “assigned at birth, one’s biological status as either male or female” while gender as “socially constructed roles, behaviours, activities and attributes that a given society considers appropriate for boys and men or girls and women”.

However, this definition is not about gender fluidity but the distinction between sex and our gender roles within society, for example, the rightful claim of women that sex should not impose some stereotype gender roles, like women are housewives while men are the breadwinners.

So-called research quoted from a Jung Journal article defining gender fluidity as “an alternative to binary (male and female) gender identities” is becoming more common. Seriously?  The Jung Journal is not a scientific journal but a website in its own words of “a beautiful international quarterly publication offering feature articles, reviews, interviews, poetry and art”.    Not much of science or research.

I wrote this article because I do not think anyone’s children should become a social experiment called ‘gender fluidity’ that can damage those children that society should protect.

The study ‘Sexuality and Gender, Findings from the Biological, Psychological,and Social Sciences’ by Lawrence S. Mayer and Paul R. McHugh, both senior scholars in the Department of Psychiatry at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, which reviewed over 500 scientific articles, concluded that while gender dysphoria can start at the age of two to four, of those that pass through it, 80 to 90 per cent return to their original gender by the time they reach adolescence.   

They further claim that the hypothesis that a person might be “a man trapped in a woman’s body” or “a woman trapped in a man’s body” is not supported by scientific evidence. 

Transgender people today have the right to change their sex classification with significant ease. Confusing children before they even learn how to walk is wrong. Leaving sex blank for sexually-defined children will only impose confusion where there was none, with possible serious psychological and physical irreparable damage.

While questioning children should be assisted professionally and with sensitivity, too early affirmation is harmful to a child when research shows that 90 per cent of these children return to their original gender by adolescence.   

Tonio Fenech is a former Minister

This is a www.timesofmalta.com opinion piece

Ref: https://timesofmalta.com/articles/view/leaving-the-sex-field-blank-tonio-fenech.839198?fbclid=IwAR3cSgTMndz82dZlRGtEv-07HRkjGrrPL3kD7tzZI3Emo7XPfeYUekskGGc

Watch out for your rights! – Arthur Muscat

Watch out for your rights! – Arthur Muscat

Equality ministry is antagonising many citizens, institutions and organisations

It would be a very condemnable undertaking but you may wake up one morning short of money and decide to stage a bank robbery. Rest assured that if you eventually action your criminal plan and get caught, unless and until your guilt is proven, beyond reasonable doubt in a court of law, your innocence status is protected.

If the ministry responsible for equality has its way, this fundamental human right will be taken away from you. In respect of equality and discrimination offences that you may be accused of allegedly committing, two acts being currently discussed in a parliamentary committee will remove this fundamental human right.

For such alleged offences you will now be a priori considered guilty and you will remain so unless and until you manage to disprove your accuser and prove your innocence.

Furthermore, facing your accuser, you will have to prove your innocence not in our established law courts, with all the guarantees of impartial and experienced magistrates and judges, no, not at all. In respect of such offences you will be tried by a sort of board made up of four lawyers plus a lay person, appointed to judge and sentence you on the basis of a majority vote.

The four lawyers on this board must each have five years’ work experience in issues relating to the right to equal treatment and non-discrimination. Explicitly, the fifth lay member must have at least five years’ experience working in this equality ‘sector’.

Now don’t we all know about the prevalent mindset of most operators in this ‘sector’? Is anyone convinced of the impeccable credentials of such members for impartiality? These people, judges in what will be a court of law, will have the power, if you do not manage to prove your innocence, to slap you with a whopping €10,000 fine, plus a tarnished reputation.

In addition to setting up the board, these acts will endow an existing Equality Commission with further very extraordinary powers. For example, measures for the advancement of gender balance, in public and private institutions, will fall within the remit of this commission with extremely enhanced enforcement powers. The filling of vacancies in the public sector may, or will, through quotas, be made subject to gender balance considerations.

Powerful lobbies of ‘minority groups’ have run away with a preposterous and exaggerated discrimination and equality agenda– Arthur Muscat

Due to such quotas, as imposed, inferior male applicants, to fill quotas, may take precedence over better qualified and meritorious females. Gender balance may, or will be made to, take precedence over meritocracy and this is how these acts will mess up another human right, a right to be considered on your worth and not on your gender. This intrusion into the right to select on merit may extend into the private sector in, for example, appointments to the board of directors of private companies.

It has been established that the proposed ‘equality act 2019’ and the ‘human rights and equality commission act 2019’ go far in excess of EU discrimination and equality legal requirements. It appears that particular ambiguous and experimental clauses of these acts will be scrutinised by EU observers eager to see the outcome of this intrusion into delicate and risky unexplored territory.

Is Maltese society so far advanced and liberal on these issues to become the leader and inspiration to the rest of Europe? I am not at all convinced, more so when I recall that, way back, former minister Helena Dalli flippantly expressed herself in the sense that, to her, a vast section of the Labour electorate was unable to comprehend the outrageous implications of particular proposed pieces of legislation.

Few people are realising how powerful lobbies of ‘minority groups’, seemingly controlled by extremists, facing a ministry engaged in a vote harvesting exercise, have run away with a preposterous and exaggerated discrimination and equality agenda. To be fair, many entities are now reacting as their members will be negatively affected by these acts as drafted. Doctors, pharmacists, conscientious objectors, employers, Church authorities, education professionals, so many focused NGOs, and significantly so many citizens have raised serious objections to these acts and are currently engaged in fighting their cause.

No doubt, we do need some updated legislation to counter persistent unacceptable and shameful treatment of women and minority groups. We do need to make possible clear and timely justice procedures to victims of discrimination and inequality. We need effective rules and more resources that will strengthen the ability of a commission like the NCPE to continue influencing society to change, to make people behave in a fair and non-discriminatory manner.

However, it is one thing to influence and educate towards ethical behaviour but it is completely something else to bully, push and coerce towards arbitrarily defined behaviours and this backed up by an abusive legal framework.

We should be careful before we invent additional tribunals that we do not need, tribunals that do not feature due guarantees of fairness and impartiality to accused citizens.

The positive features of our judicial set-up need to be strengthened, more appointments of, and training for, judges and magistrates, more streamlined and timely judicial proceedings that will make justice more expeditious, less costly, less intimidating and easily accessible to all.

Surely from a jurisdictional angle competently tackling issues of discrimination and equality is not an unreachable objective.

The ministry responsible for equality must understand that these acts, with their many aggressive and erroneous clauses and definitions, are antagonising so many citizens, institutions and organisations. Equality and prevention of discrimination, correctly considered, are issues that should have us converge and unite and not cause alienating confrontations.

Short of completely dropping them, the ministry must definitely revisit these two draft acts and erase those passages that threaten the rights and perturb the peace of mind of the vast majority of citizens.

 

This is a timesofmalta.com opinion piece

Ref: https://timesofmalta.com/articles/view/watch-out-for-your-rights-arthur-muscat.835799

The Truth About Emergency Contraception (MAP)

The Truth About Emergency Contraception (MAP)

We have a duty as scientists and healthcare professionals – and as humans – to expose the fallacy that emergency contraception (EC) – the “morning-after pill” – is not abortifacient. To do this I have drawn up the following write-up, which is also a synopsis of a previous piece, which, also rests on the evidence given by other scientists and medical professionals who have contributed in this field, in scientific, medical, legal and ethical research and literature.

Two of the reasons why I am writing again is because it is disquieting that we are faced with misinformation again and that pharmacists might be obliged to sell ECs, even if it goes against their conscience and morals. It is not equality at all to be ok with offending the sentiments of a particular group in order not to offend those of another category. It is evident that this is exactly the opposite.

Despite all considerable evidence regarding the abortifacient effect of ECs, some continue to deride those who maintain that ECs are abortifacient. Their arguments can hold water, only if one accepts the definition of conception, that is, the implantation of a fertilized ovum, adopted by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) in the 1960. For the rest of the world, or at least most of it, fertilization and conception are synonymous and mark the beginning of a new living organism.  (Charlotte Lozier Institute 2014, Sadler and Langman 2010, O’Rahilly and Müller 1996, Moore and Persaud 1993). 

However, our modern abortionists have become past masters of double-talk and the art of equivocation. For example, they substitute product of conception for pre-born child or by using the word choice instead of abortion. A word like abortion is too ugly and violent and sends negative messages. Indeed, all abortionists see red when one insists on conscience rights and conscientious objection. They are the most belligerent votaries of the cult of “the politically correct”. Serious scientific and scholarly research has proved that most popular emergency “contraceptives” can cause the death of embryos. For the sake of intellectual honesty, this truth must be accepted and acknowledged. Only thus, can we take informed decisions. But even if we refuse to look at the scientific truth in the face, as humans, we ought to feel prickly pangs of conscience when terminating the joy of a new birth.

However, our modern abortionists have managed to find a way to numb conscience. The equivocation is camouflaged in the prefix “pre“:  so, they have invented pre-pregnancy, pre-fertilization, pre-embryo and even such a meaningless word as pre-life when life exists already. Therefore, it is best to stick to scientific facts and base our arguments on empirical surveys. In case of EC we must stress clarity and follow the American maxim and say, “It walks like a duck, it quacks like a duck, it is a duck”. To start with, following are a few (of the multitude) scientific definitions on the beginning of life:

  • “Human development begins at fertilization, when a sperm fuses with an oocyte to form a single cell, the zygote(one cell embryo). This highly specialised, totipotent cell (capable of giving rise to any cell type) marks the beginning of each of us as a unique individual.” (The Developing Human: Clinically Oriented Embryology, Saunders 2016).
  • “Human pregnancy begins with the fusion of an egg and a sperm within the female reproductive tract.” (Human Embryology and Developmental Biology. Elsevier, Saunders, 2014).
  • “The seminal question in modern developmental biology is the origins of new life arising from the unification of sperm and egg.” (Gene expression during the oocyte-to-embryo transition in mammals. Evsikov AV, Marín de Evsikova C. Molecular Reproduction and Development, 2009).

 

The above quotations from scientific and medical sources prove that fertilization is synonymous with the very first instance of human life. So, it follows that any artefact terminating the result of fertilization is indeed an abortifacient. Therefore, whether ECs can induce abortion depends upon when a new human life begins. The scientific reality is that when a human egg and sperm unite (fertilization), the newly formed being contains the full genome in which hair and eye colour, gender and all physical characteristics are determined.

In the first hours of existence, the embryo signals the mother to lower her immune system, prompting her body mechanism to release the Early Pregnancy Factor and this protein is detectable in maternal blood as early as 24 hours after fertilization (Charlotte Lozier Institute 2014). During its journey down the fallopian tube, the fertilized egg is actively growing and dividing itself. It will implant in the uterine lining where it will continue to grow. One of the ways ECs may work is to alter the uterine lining so that a fertilized egg (the embryo) may not be able to implant and grow (Kahleborn, Stanford, Larimore 2002, Kahlenborn, Peck, Severs, 2014, Mozzanega and Cosmi 2010, Peck and Vélez 2013, Morris and van Wagenen 1973, Rabone, 1990, Stratton et al 2010, Turlock Pregnancy Center 2016).

Also, certain ECs have inferior effect on ovulation than other ECs (Brache, Cochon, Deniaud, and Croxatto, 2013). So other mechanisms of action would prevail to stop the process of life. What are these?

An interesting fact is that mifepristone, which is marketed (in various countries) as an abortion pill, is also used (at lower doses) as an EC. Mifepristone effectively kills embryos in approximately six weeks after implantation. Mifepristone is also molecularly very similar to ulipristal acetate, the active ingredient of mainstream EC. It may be taken within 120 hours (five days) of unprotected sex or contraceptive failure (such as a tear in a condom during sex)!

So, the term “Morning-After pill” is also a misnomer! In the 2010 study of Stratton et al mifepristone and ulipristal acetate were compared. The following is a self-explanatory excerpt. (Here, one has to keep in view that mifepristone has also an abortive effect because it causes reduction in molecular markers for implantation, progesterone action and endometrial thickness): “….either effect of CDB-2914 [ulipristal acetate], endometrial atrophy or combined proliferation (endometrial hyperplasia – tissue growth), however, may hamper implantation. 

Single dose of CDB-2914 given to normal women at other times of the cycle have yielded effects similar to mifepristone’s on the endometrium, ovary and menstrual cycle.

In the luteal phase, a single 200mg mid-luteal dose of CDB-2914 caused early menses and less frequently functional luteolyses, as did 200mg of mifepristone [as an abortifacient it is marketed as 200mg tablets]. Lower amounts of mifepristone (10mg) administered twice in the mid-luteal phase induced stormal edema and delayed glandular development without changes in the cycle length. With a single late-follicular dose, luteal phase endometrial maturation was delayed in 70% of the biopsies at each dose of CDB-2914 (10, 50 and 100mg) compared with 17% in the placebo group. A delay in ovulation and suppression of estradiol levels was less frequently observed and was dose dependent. Similarly, 100mg of mifepristone administered from days 10 to 17 delayed both ovulation and endometrial maturation… In contrast to histologic dating, molecular markings of implantation and progressive action and decreased endometrial thickness were reduced by CDB-2914 in a dose dependent fashion.”

In Destroying unwanted embryos in Research: Talking Point on morality and human embryo research, Thomas Douglas and Julian Savulescu of EMBO (European Molecular Biology Organisation 2009), estimate that more than 50% of embryos die within eight weeks of conception, even if no direct actions are taken to end their lives. This vulnerability has also been unbelievably posited as a justification for considering implantation as the beginning of pregnancy, even the beginning of Life. So, here, the reasoning is that the phase following fertilization until implantation is a pre-pregnancy phase. By this reasoning even lethal experiments could be performed on pre-implantation human embryos. Yet, this fragile creature is indisputably human. His or her vulnerability should rather be a call for greater care than for annihilation (European Molecular Biology Organisation 2009). In plain language, we are aware of the vulnerability of embryos and yet, instead of striving to protect them even more, we use it as a prime justification for destroying them. But abortionists are not destroying life, it is a thing called pre-“something”. Abortionists seek excuses to terminate Life and to distort facts, they insult in their faces those parents who have lost a child, be it through a miscarriage or at a later stage in life.

I have gone into perhaps fastidious details to prove that the Morning After Pill is an abortifacient by any other name, but we are free to refuse to listen to reason and science and continue on the way to oblivion. Even at this late hour, it is not too late. All stakeholders must step forward to convince that it is both inhuman and self-defeating to terminate the unborn. Nice words can never hide ugly deeds.

 

Jean Pierre Fava holds a B.Sc. (Hons.) and M.Sc. in Health Science

This is a independent.com.mt opinion piece

Ref: https://www.independent.com.mt/articles/2020-11-29/newspaper-opinions/The-truth-about-emergency-contraception-6736229001