Category: Abortion

Northern Ireland: Hundreds of medical professionals will refuse to provide abortion services, doctor warns

Northern Irish GP’s warning comes after abortion decriminalised in Northern Ireland

Independent

Maya Oppenheim

Hundreds of healthcare professionals in Northern Ireland will refuse to be involved in services which carry out abortions, a doctor has warned.

Abortion has long been illegal in Northern Ireland in almost all circumstances – including rape and incest – but the procedure was decriminalised in Northern Ireland on Tuesday.

Andrew Cupples, a Northern Irish GP who is strongly opposed to the liberalisation of abortion laws, has said a number of healthcare professionals have personally told him they would leave their jobs if they were made to carry out an abortion. . . [Full text]

Anti-abortion law firm says Reproductive Health Act violates federal law

State’s abortion law discriminates against employers with religious objections, complaint claims

mySuburbanLife.com

Rebecca Anzel

SPRINGFIELD — Illinois’ new reproductive health care law is a “blatant violation” of residents’ religious and conscience rights, pro-life law firm official Peter Breen said.

The Thomas More Society, based in Chicago, filed a complaint Oct. 21 with the U.S. Health and Human Services’ Office for Civil Rights alleging an element of the Reproductive Health Act breaches federal law.

Breen, the organization’s vice president and senior counsel, said on June 12, when Democratic Gov. JB Pritzker signed the statute, that his firm would mount a legal challenge. It is now asking the federal government to “prevent or halt” that law from being enforced. . . [Full text]

Alberta Catholic doctors fear erosion of conscience rights

Grandin Media

Andrew Ehrkamp

Many Catholic doctors in Alberta are worried that they will soon be forced to provide referrals for medically assisted suicide, says the head of the provincial St. Luke’s Physicians’ Guild.

Dr. Mary Ellen Haggerty says a recent Ontario court decision sets a precedent that will lead to a legal requirement that any doctor in Alberta must provide that referral. For Catholics, such a referral would make them morally complicit in the act itself. To date the doctors have been protected by the Charter rights to freedom of conscience and freedom of religion if they refused to participate in assisted suicide and euthanasia, as well as abortion and other controversial procedures. . . [Full text]

Contentious system is running smoothly south of the border

Belfast Telegraph

Eilish O’Regan

Abortion was among the most divisive issues in the Republic of Ireland for decades.

It was regarded as politically toxic with various governments relying on the courts to rule on when termination of pregnancy be permitted or prohibited.

All the while it was a daily reality. Thousands of women from the 26 counties were going to the UK for terminations annually – over 3,000 in 2017. There was growing use of online abortion pills although they were illegal.

But since January this year, and the triggering of new legislation, abortion has been legally available in most counties in the South, at a level which only a few years ago many would have regarded as “liberal”.

It has not been without some controversy, but everyone is surprised by how relatively smoothly it is running. . . [Full text]

Medical professionals concerned their ethical rights may be eroded by health reforms

1newsnow

Nicole Bremner

The New Zealand Medical Council says it’s ‘up to the challenge’ of three controversial law changes currently before Parliament.

A new law enabling the terminally ill to access assisted dying, along with reform to cannabis and abortion laws, has sparked widespread and sometimes heated public debate.

“I think these (proposals) represent a potential challenge to the medical profession,” says Dr Curtis Walker, Chair of the NZ Medical Council. “But I know the medical profession is up to it.” [Full text]