Early life, suffering and killing in Australia

The NSW premier made an historic apology to those traumatised by forced adoptions in the latter half of last century in Australia (news article). It was an emotional event, with people crying, and a lot of people, both mothers and adopted children, finding an opportunity to forgive and move on.

The "widespread" policy of forced adoption, parliament heard, was sanctioned by governments, churches, hospitals, charities and bureaucrats. But to the mostly young and single mothers involved, they were more like abductions or kidnappings. [...]

As MPs stood to carry the motion with a minute's silence, several dabbed at their eyes with tissues. One MP crossed himself. Many of the estimated 300 people in the public galleries at the joint sitting had wept throughout half an hour of emotional speeches.

They heard stories of young mothers who were tied to beds while their babies were induced, who never saw their babies before they were taken away, who were drugged, sedated and given lactation suppressants to dry up their milk, who were told lies that their babies had died, only to discover years later they were alive.

It seems Australians value children enough to acknowledge how awful it is to rip them away from their mothers at birth.

The question must be asked, what then of children who are killed before birth?

When will any Australian parliament say 'sorry' for condoning the thousands of abortions that take place in Australia every year? The parallels between forced adoption and abortion that occurs in young single girls who feel under pressure to 'get rid of the baby', sometimes even without the knowledge of their parents or any support person, is absolutely tragic.

The psychological and spiritual trauma that occurs as a result of abortion is undeniable for a number of women (link), whether related to a moral dilemma itself, to grief over loss of the baby, grief about the repercussions on relationship, or a 'head vs heart' dilemma (read more here, here, here and here). Many of us personally know young women in our lives who have been pressured or have felt pressured to abort their babies, and some have regretted the event so much they intentionally got pregnant later down the track to quench a thirst for life. 

There are an estimated 90 to 100,000 surgical abortions annually in Australia. The number of medical abortions is estimated to be >5,000 per year, unconfirmed but increasing due to the increasing availability of the mifepristone (RU486) pill. Per woman, abortions are common, with 20 per 1,000 women of reproductive age having an abortion per year (similar to US and UK, but much higher than 6 per 1,000 in Belgium and Holland). One woman in three will have an abortion in the course of her life in Australia.

The vast majority occur before 12 weeks of pregnancy (88-90%), and 1-2% occur after 16 weeks (age depicted in photograph below).

Abortion technically remains a crime everywhere in Australia except Victoria and the ACT, although various court cases and reforms to the States’ legislation have allowed a ‘liberal’ interpretation of abortion law in most States. In Queensland, the State with the most punitive view on abortion, the Criminal Code Act of 1899 contains the following sections:

S224 attributes criminality on the doctor

S225 attributes criminality on the woman

S226 attributes criminality for unlawfully supplying anything (whether substance or instrument) with the intention of procuring an abortion

S282 allows ‘surgical operations’ on the child or mother ‘for the preservation of the mother’s life if the performance of the operation is reasonable, having regard to the patient’s state at the time and all the circumstances of the case’

Since 2009, S282 has been interpreted in the common law to also allow medical procedures. The 'preservation of the mother's life' also includes consideration of a mother's mental state as suicidal, and this is the loop-hole currently used in Queensland to procure abortions. Queensland Health condones and performs abortion when it is recommended by two medical specialists, is medically safe, and when the woman concerned consents and is deemed capable of consenting. Elective abortions basically mean there is no physically reason for the abortion, and in this case Queensland Health requires all women wanting an abortion to be assessed by a psychiatrist to certify that the women would a risk to her own life if she were to proceed with the pregnancy. In practice, this is a 'tick and flick' procedure.

Although doctors are instructed to discuss all available options including adoption to pregnant mothers wanting an abortion, adoption is inconsistently – and in some institutions, rarely – mentioned in the course of the consultation. The UK Royal College of Obstetrician and Gynaecologist guidelines  state that 'Women should have access to objective information and, if required, counselling and decision-making support about their pregnancy options'. Not once is adoption mentioned in the guideline document. It is tragic that medical students in general cannot cite a single adoption agency or support group name to give to their future patients. It highlights the bias inherent in the medical education system toward ushering women onto one path rather than another.

Especially in an age where there is such an untenable supply of childless parents wanting to adopt, why not give the baby the gift of life in a happy home, rather than killing it? It's a terrible irony that on the one hand the Australian birth rate is declining, with women increasingly leaving it too late to have their babies and many couples unable but deeply desiring to have children, while the rest of the population is killing 1 in 4 unborn children. Why not give them a chance? Yes, it does mean carrying the pregnancy to term, with all its discomforts and inconveniences, but how much inconvenience is one willing to go through for the sake of a human life? Which is the more righteous path?

The so-called ‘psychological safety’ of abortion demonstrated in two meta-analytical review articles (here and here) looks at the incidence of new psychiatric disorders after abortion. They emphasise that the strongest predictor of new psychiatric disorders is pre-existing mental illness, which is itself strongly associated with exposure to sexual abuse and intimate violence. Women and girls who have suffered some form of sexual abuse are unfortunately highly prevalent in the community, and the review articles therefore should not dismiss psychological sequelae as happening only to a 'small minority' of girls. Furthermore, the studies do not measure sub-clinical regret or trauma that does not constitute a major psychiatric disorder defined by the DSM-IV criteria, let alone a spiritual level of trauma that cannot be measured in the medical diagnostic framework (read more). How can you define and delineate the beginning and end of 'an emotional response'? Women's experiences of pregnancy are complex and nuanced, with many women experiencing a 'head vs heart' dilemma, with a deeper part of themselves not wishing to end the pregnancy. 

Recently, the medical abortion pill has been approved by the Therapeutics Goods Administration as a relatively 'safe' drug for importation into Australia, and the Marie Stopes organisation, which provides abortions in several locations in Australia, has opened a training course for GPs so that the pill will be more widely available in the community. Marie Stopes is even considering applying for Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme coverage of the abortion pill. This means Australia is joining the UK, the US, France and New Zealand, which have given access to the pill for about twenty years.

The greatest hypocrisy is how much we value our prematurely born babies. We choose to 'keep' and to help our babies survive even before they are completely mature enough to live without medical assistance. We might put extraordinary efforts into saving a 22-week old, and yet where surgical abortion is legal it is performed up to 18 weeks' gestation. Why do those four weeks of age make the difference between what we call human and what we don't? Between 'the baby' and 'the pregnancy'? Are we killing babies or just 'terminating pregnancies'? How long can we kid ourselves?

Many people would support abortion "if the mother had been raped". How many young women who are having abortions were raped? A very small minority. Most women in Australia who are chosing to kill their babies had consensual sex. 

Falling pregnant should never come as a shock. We should never ask, 'Where did that come from?' If a woman has sex, there is always a chance of falling pregnant. Women generally have an unrealistic level of confidence in the effectiveness of contraception. Whereas the oral contraceptive pill is 99% effective when used perfectly according to manufacturer instructions, its effectiveness in general use in the community is between 80 and 94%, depending on pills missed/forgotten and occasionally gut malabsorption. How many stories do we all know of 'surprise' pregnancies amongst our families and friends? Half of all pregnancies in Queensland are unplanned, and a quarter of all pregnancies in Queensland will be aborted (link). Half of all women wanting abortion had been using contraception (link). 

In ideal family upbringing, young women should be taught emphatically that there is always a chance of pregnancy with sex, and that they should only consent to that sexual encounter if they are prepared to accept the chance of pregnancy and everything that ensues. As we know, countless young girls are unprepared  for the day they might start having intercourse in unfavourable circumstances, circumstances which many regret later on for not matching their desires or expectations of a loving union with the right person, expectations which are often instinctively consistent with God's plan for sex and love.

Australia faces a higher incidence of teenage pregnancy than Europe (but lower than the US, UK or Canada), which is an age group in which the majority of pregnancies are aborted (links here and here). This is coupled with a societal trend of breakdown in family cohesion, increasing dependence on welfare across the population, stable rate of single parents (around 10% of the population), and rising teenage alcohol-related hospitalisations, all of which are accentuated in the Indigenous population.

Accountability in the realm of sexual behaviour has almost completely deserted our society. Every effort in the current prevailing worldview is to remove any trace of accountability. No negative consequences for any action. No consequences for sexually transmitted infections - we have condoms to prevent that. No consequences for not wearing condoms and acquiring an STI - we have antibitiocs. No consequences for falling pregnant - we can just 'terminate' our pregnancies.

Abortion in the context of a child with a detected disability is another area that demands consideration. Ultimately, the question must be asked, how far down the eugenics path are we willing to go? Parents with children with Down's syndrome, for instance, one of the disabilities commonly screened antenatally, often have a very rough road ahead of them with a lot of sacrifice in store. But does the prospect of hard work and sacrifice over the life of the child preclude our commitment to love? Are we to be the executioners of our disabled children?

I've heard it said, God cares less about our suffering in difficult times, and more about our response to those difficult times. And although it can be a very long and hard hard road caring for a disabled child, many parents have also found joy in the midst of the struggle. Where would we be if we annihilated any need in the course of life for loving sacrificial action, and always followed the easy path even if it means killing?

A challenging video putting abortion into the perspective of other moral dilemmas and challenging people's often complacent worldviews has been criticised by some, although it does point out the weaknesses in the way people think about the value of human life.

Rather than any effort to denigrate, shame or mistreat young pregnant women or any woman who has previously had an abortion, what should be our response?

First, to love. The anxiety around an unplanned pregnancy can be enormous, especially when overwhelmed by the expectations of parents, boyfriends or society not to keep the child. We need to embrace these women with compassion and unconditional love through this stressful time of dilemma and anxieties about the future.

Second, to support. Women often don't realise the full breadth of options available to them. Many women are afraid of the apparently terrible impact having a baby could have on their education or their career. They need to be told that they can have their cake and eat it too. We have been blessed with countless role models of strong smart women who have attained the highest levels of educational and professional achievement while also having babies along the way, including unplanned babies. Existing mothers who already have mouths to feed, and who perhaps have been deserted by the father in the midst of financial and job uncertainty - these women need to know they will be cared for. Help needs to be given, financial, in kind and otherwise by Christians so that these women feel they can keep their child and survive it, knowing the loving charity given to them by another person, and the grace of God.