Category: Abortion

Polish law and conduct of Polish physicians, clergy, activists and authorities leads to adverse judgement

Sean Murphy*

The European Court of Human Rights has issued a judgement adverse to freedom of conscience and ordered Poland to pay two complainants, a mother and daughter, a total of 61,000 Euros in damages and costs.  Subject to the possibility that the English translation of the judgement is faulty, the use of the term “anti-choice activist” by the judges brings their impartiality into question.  However, the facts of the case outlined in the judgement suggest that the conduct of Polish health care personnel, anti-abortion activists, clergy and state authorities effectively guaranteed an adverse outcome.

A 14 year old girl, P. supported by her mother, S.,  sought an abortion for a pregnancy alleged to have been the result of a rape.  While she obtained the necessary prosecutor’s certificate for the procedure, mother and daughter received contradictory information from two public hospitals in Lublin.  Further, health care personnel clearly violated principles of patient confidentiality and informed consent in an effort to dissuade the girl from having an abortion.  These violations included clearly coercive and manipulative tactics.  P and S experienced

  • the intervention of a priest and anti-abortion activists, unsolicited and unwanted,
  • importuning by anti-abortion activists that included confrontations in public,
  • national media attention, including a press release issued by a hospital concerning P,
  • detention and six hours of questioning by the police,
  • apprehension of the girl by state authorities, apparently for the express purpose of preventing the abortion,
  • posting on internet by the Catholic News Agency of the girl’s travel to Gdansk for an abortion,
  • the filing of criminal charges against the girl for having had unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor (i.e., the rape that resulted in pregnancy)

While the court found that objecting physicians had a legal obligation to refer patients for abortion, the source of that legal obligation was Polish law.  Article 39 of Poland’s Doctor and Dentist Professions Act imposes a legal obligation of referral.  The imposition is objectionable in principle, but the European Court of Human Rights can hardly be criticized for applying Polish law to Polish citizens.

Abortion described as a “right”

In a commentary on CBC Radio, Canada’s publicly funded state broadcaster, Prince Edward Island University professor Richard Raiswell  asserted that “abortion is a medically necessary, essential health care service” and insisted that all Canadian women have a “right” to the service.  Since the province does not provide abortion on the island, Raiswell argues that women who have to leave the island to obtain the procedure “are being denied access to safe medical care.”  He suggested that that is illegal. [CBC Radio]

Midwives to appeal court ruling against freedom of conscience

Two midwives who were ordered to supervise the provision of abortions are appealing the decision of the Court of Session in Edinburgh against freedom of conscience.[Herald Scotland]

Herald Scotland:

Prominent Masschusetts physicians advocate civil disobedience

A former editor of the New England Journal of Medicine and a professor at Harvard Medical school are urging that American physicians practice civil disobedience by refusing to obey laws that block access to abortion and contraception.  “The unspoken assumption by state legislators seems to be that doctors will,” write Marcia Angell and Michael Greene,”. . . acquiesce with these new laws, that they are simply neutral agents who will comply with whatever the state orders.”  They argue that physicians “have ethical commitments to patients that they cannot and should not be required by state law to set aside.” [USA Today]

Swedish physicians expected to arrange abortions on demand

A Swedish health authority has ruled that physicians must facilitate abortions if patients request them even if they are doubtful about the mental stability of the patient.  The ruling followed a complaint from a woman whose physician cancelled an abortion and recommended that she see a counsellor because of concern that she was not “mentally balanced.”  The physician’s decision was prompted by conversation with the patient’s husband the day before the scheduled procedure [The Local].