The Canadian Medical Association Journal has published an article in which the author laments the lack of surgical abortion options across many parts of the country and calls for increased access to a currently unapproved chemical abortion method in “underserved” areas. The article comes at a time when Health Canada considers an application for the chemical abortion drug known as RU-486 (mifepristone).
In the piece published online Nov. 20 and titled “Abortion access grim in English Canada,” CMAJ writer Lauren Vogel highlights a newly released survey taken in 2012 of abortion services in Canada that aims to show many women across the country do not have easy access or options for ending the lives of their “unwanted” pre-born children.
The survey was funded by the Society of Family Planning, an academic society of researchers, clinicians, and educators dedicated to expanding contraception and abortion. It was released at the Family Medicine Forum in Quebec City on Nov. 12.
The survey interestingly found that of Canada’s 94 dedicated abortion facilities, 46 are found in Quebec, a province facing a total fertility rate of 1.69, which is below the golden 2.1 necessary to sustain the population. The survey also found that the vast majority of abortions (96 percent) are surgical and are performed in a clinical setting.
Mary Ellen Douglas of Campaign Life Coalition called the survey and the corresponding CMAJ article “strictly pro-abortion pieces of propaganda.”
Instead of following the time-tested ethical standards as set down in the Hippocratic oath — to do nothing that would end a woman’s pregnancy — the Canadian Medical Association (CMA) supports abortion. In 2012, in response to MP Steven Woodworth’s motion filed in the House to look into the humanity of the pre-born, the CMA voted to uphold the country’s Criminal Code, which states that a baby becomes a “human being” only after being born.
“The pro-abortion battle cry for the last 25 years has been ‘we need more access.’ This could have been written by [abortion giant] Planned Parenthood,” Douglas told LifeSiteNews.
In her article, Vogel quotes the authors of the survey who suggest that making chemical abortions available is the only way to ensure women have “equitable access” to abortion.
“It saves women having to travel. It saves them having to undergo a surgical procedure,” said co-investigator of the survey Dr. Edith Guilbert, a senior medical advisor at the National Institute of Public Health of Quebec.
Vogel ends her article quoting survey co-investigator Dr. Wendy Norman who suggests that “top-notch” access to abortion can only be achieved by making available non-surgical, i.e. chemical methods of abortion.
But pro-life activists are quick to point out that chemical abortion methods such as RU-486 are not without complications in medical settings and can be deadly to women in remote areas with limited access to medical facilities.
“The only problem is that if there's no hospital nearby, what happens when there's a severe complication? Women have died of RU-486. Is she going to have to be airlifted to hospital?” said Suzanne Fortin, who blogs at Big Blue Wave.
RU-486 has been touted by its advocates as a “safe” abortion method, but practically every country that has approved the method has had women die from complications of the chemical cocktail.
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In April, doctors in a Turin hospital could do nothing to save a woman who went into cardiac arrest after taking the second part of the two-drug RU-486 combination that would expel the baby from her womb. In the United States alone, 14 women have died after taking RU-486, reported the Food and Drug Administration in 2011.
Fortin does not want to see unsuspecting Canadian women in remote areas dying from chemical abortion.
“One of the reasons why women die of chemical abortions in the Third World is precisely because they don't have access to a clinic or hospital. Are abortion activists going to recreate these conditions [here]?”
Douglas agrees, adding that giving a problematic drug with documented risks to women in remote areas amounts to giving them a death warrant.
“Abortion activists are so wanting this right to kill, that they really don’t care about the woman, or they wouldn’t be pushing a pill like this that has caused death in other countries.”
Douglas said that what Canadian women need is “help to carry their babies to term.”
“When they’re pregnant, there is another person involved. It’s not all about them. They don’t need more access to killing.”
“We have a glut of dead babies in Canada, and abortion activists want more,” she said, noting Canada has over 100,000 abortions every year.