March 14, 2018 (Society for the Protection of Unborn Children) – On Tuesday, Jackie Doyle-Price, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health, confirmed in Parliament that a booking service to fast-track women from Northern Ireland for abortions in Britain is to be run by BPAS, Britain's biggest abortion provider.
No care for women
On International Women's Day, Liam Gibson, SPUC's Northern Ireland development officer said that the decision “proves that the UK government is more concerned with the interests of abortionists than helping women. This service will be nothing less than the sales force of the abortion industry.”
As well as depriving unborn children of the protection the law in the Province offers them, “this decision shows the Theresa May’s government doesn’t care about women either,” Mr Gibson continued. “If it did it wouldn’t hand them over to people with a vested financial interest in making sure they go through with an abortion they may well regret.”
bpas endangers women
Furthermore, Mr Gibson says, “We know from the reports of the Care Quality Commission that bpas abortion facilities have a long history of shoddy standards and illegal practices.” A bpas clinic in Merseyside was condemned by health watchdogs over safety issues after 11 women were transferred to hospital for emergency treatment. “This bpas-run booking service will only serve the abortion industry and endanger the health and safety of women from Northern Ireland.”
He also mentioned how appalling it is that the UK Government should be in partnership with an organisation like bpas, when it's head, Ann Furedi, has argued for abortion up to birth for any reason, including on the ground that the baby is a girl. (Loose Women shocked at bpas boss Ann Furedi extreme abortion agenda).
Abortion pills
Bpas have also been campaigning for abortion pills to be dispensed for women to take at home, outside of medical supervision. SPUC Scotland is currently challenging the Scottish Government's decision to allow this, and the proposed abortion legislation in Ireland involves GPs dispensing the pills. However, a poll of 497 family doctors in Ireland has found that 7 in 10 would refuse to take part in medical abortions.
Alongside any deeper moral objections to abortion, doctors in Ireland are clearly worried about providing medication abortions in particular. One GP, Dr Máire Neasta Nic Gearailt, pointed out in the Irish Examiner that a “woman will experience cramping and heavy bleeding before the baby is expelled. How are GPs, operating in busy and crowded practises with common waiting rooms, expected to medically supervise this procedure?
“Neither are most GP surgeries the ideal place to deal with any emergencies that might arise from any adverse sequelae from taking these tablets,” she went on. “Whatever the view of an individual GP on the abortion issue, we simply are not currently equipped as a profession to cope with what is being proposed by health minister Simon Harris. We lack the facilities, the training, the time, and yes, the resources.”
Published with permission from the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children.