It may have been a throw away comment as part of a wider interview but the new Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt has reiterated his belief in a reduction of the abortion time limit to 12 weeks. This, he says, is his personal view based on evidence. So what is the evidence? Scientific opinion is that […]
Tag: abortion
Marge Berer: Jeremy Hunt supports 12 week limit for abortion
At the Labour conference last week, Andy Burnham accused Jeremy Hunt of failing to make any statements about important current health service issues in parliament since he became health secretary. What a pity he decided to speak up last week, because now we know just how uninformed he is. Hunt said he favoured reducing the […]
Marge Berer: Independent abortion counselling? Whose problem?
Nadine Dorries MP is a very skilful politician. She decides there is a problem, for which she has absolutely no evidence. She not only manages to get her problem on to the front pages of the newspapers but also on to the agenda of the House of Commons. Having spoken to her about it, the […]
Vasiliy Vlassov: Russian women’s reproductive rights in grave danger
According to current Russian law, women can ask for an elective abortion up until 12 weeks of pregnancy. Between 12 and 22 weeks, an abortion can only be made on the basis of medical or so called “social” indications laid out by the government. Over the years, the government has dramatically decreased the number of reasons that […]
Bob Roehr on Mila Means – a physician at the centre of the US abortion wars
Demonstrations for and against the question of abortion are going on all this week outside a clinic in Germantown, Maryland, in the suburbs of Washington, DC. Opponents of abortion have also broadened their attack to seek greater restrictions on sex education and reproductive health. They have particularly targeted government funding and services contracts for the medical charity […]
Neil Chanchlani: Conscientious objection
“See one, do one, teach one?” Gone are the days when medical students did what they were told, learnt what was on the syllabus, and spoke when spoken to. “See one, do one, teach one?” Not a chance. Instead, they conscientiously object. […]
Edward Davies: Abstain from emotive rhetoric, please
When I read yesterday that “anti-abortion group” Life had been asked to join a government advisory panel on sexual health, my heart sank a bit. Not because they have been asked to join – it strikes me that in a group of a dozen or so organisations to have one representing this view is probably […]
Vidhya Alakeson on the US election
After the Democratic Convention last week, when healthcare featured in almost every major speech, I had been waiting all week to see whether the Republicans would talk about it at all during their Convention in Minneapolis. Yesterday, on the last day of the Convention, healthcare reform finally got a mention when John McCain took to […]