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Edinburgh, Scotland, May 23, 2019 / 05:01 pm (CNA).- A pro-life group in Scotland has, for a second time, lost a legal challenge against the government’s decision last year to allow women to self-administer abortion pills at home.

“We are greatly saddened by this decision. We have been convinced all along that the policy decision by the Chief Medical Officer and Scottish Government was illegal, as well as detrimental to the well-being of women in our country,” said John Deighan, chief executive of the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children Scotland.

“Women should not be facing the mental anguish that accompanies DIY abortions, nor any abortion for that matter. However, those concerns have not been upheld by the judges,” he said.

A three-judge panel ruled against the pro-life group’s appeal May 22, stating that a registered medical practitioner is still responsible for the treatment, whether it takes place in a clinic or in the home, and that even at home “control in the appropriate sense is maintained.”

The Scottish Parliament secured the legal right to govern abortion issues in 2016, and in October 2017 the country’s chief medical officer, Dr Catherine Calderwood, told Scottish health boards that misoprostol could be taken outside a clinical setting.

Misoprostol is the second in a two-drug combination used in early abortions; women who have suffered an early miscarriage can take the drug at home to induce labor, while previously women seeking abortions had to take both drugs in a clinical setting.

With the new rules in place, women can take the first of the two drugs, mifepristone, at a clinic, and then 24 to 48 hours later take misoprostol at home.

In November 2017, when plans to permit at-home abortion pill administration were first announced, the Scottish bishops objected that “making abortion easier ignores the disturbing reality that an innocent human life is ended,” the U.K. newspaper The Catholic Herald reports.

SPUC lost its first appeal against the government’s decision in August 2018, but challenged it again this April, arguing in court that the Abortion Act 1967 requires the presence of doctors, nurse, and medical staff.

In addition, the act lays out specific rules for approved places where abortions can take place, and did not intend to allow abortions at home, they said.

Pro-abortion groups backed the change, including Abortion Rights, the Family Planning Association and the Scottish Humanist Society, arguing that “abortion should be treated no differently” than other medical procedures that allow self-administration of drugs at home.

“The move to trivialize abortion is one that harms women and creates an environment where some women are even urged to have an abortion because it does not suit others,” Deighan said, saying the government plan amounts to approving “backstreet abortions.”

Ultimately, the court agreed with the abortion-rights groups’ arguments, endorsing the previous ruling against the appeal.

“We do not accept that the doctor’s control or supervision over the treatment differs in any material way between the situation of taking the tablet within the clinic and then leaving; and that of delaying the taking of the tablet to allow the woman to travel home. Both result in the termination of the pregnancy taking place outside of the clinic,” the three-judge panel wrote, according to the Scottish newspaper The National.

“The reclaimer has been unable convincingly to explain why an outpatient clinic or [general practitioner’s office] would necessarily be a ‘safer’ or more suitable place to take a tablet or pessary than the woman’s home.”

Deighan thanked SPUC’s supporters for making the appeal possible, and reiterated that “women deserve better than abortion.”

“We have always been motivated by concern for the women who undergo abortion as well as our concern for the right to life. But we had hoped that the rule of law would at least hold the aspirations of pro-abortion forces at bay,” Deighan commented.

“It is difficult for us to see how having an abortion at home can possibly satisfy the legal requirement for medical supervision.”

In terms of next steps, taking the case to the UK Supreme Court could be an option, he told reporters.

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Cardinal Silvano Maria Tomasi. / Martin Micallef/Maltese Association Order of Malta via Flickr.

Rome, Italy, Jan 26, 2022 / 12:00 pm (CNA).
In a turn of events described as a “direct attack” on the Order of Malta’s sovereignty, Pope Francis’ de… […]

Denver Newsroom, Apr 23, 2020 / 02:35 pm (CNA).- A British judge’s order requiring a contraceptive device be implanted in a woman with learning disabilities against her will is “deeply problematic,” a bioethicist has said.

Justice Gwynneth Knowles issued a written ruling April 21 after a hearing at the Court of Protection in London that took place via Skype due to the coronavirus lockdown.

The BBC reported that the judge decided that an implanted contraceptive device would be in the best interests of the woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons.

She said the woman, who is in her 20s and pregnant, lacked the mental capacity to make decisions about contraception. The court heard that the woman had given birth to a number of children, who have been taken into foster care. Specialists noted that she had suffered from a number of health problems and argued that further pregnancies could present significant risks.

According to the BBC, the woman agreed to having a contraceptive injection every three months, but did not want to be fitted with a contraceptive device.

The Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, which is responsible for the woman’s care, argued that she might miss the quarterly appointments and should therefore be fitted with the device.

The judge said the device should be fitted when the woman undergoes a planned Cesarean section, the BBC reported.

Michael Wee, education and research officer at the Anscombe Bioethics Centre in Oxford, argued that the ruling was “morally inappropriate” and “heavy-handed”.

“This judgment is deeply problematic because it raises fundamental questions of whether contraception should be seen as an acceptable medical or social intervention to solve a problem, and whether it is the kind of intervention that the state or the judiciary should ever encourage or compel by law.”

“This is a case concerning a person lacking the relevant mental capacity for the decision at hand, which is whether to have a contraceptive device fitted or not. Under the Mental Capacity Act 2005, in such cases the Court of Protection takes on the role of determining what is in the person’s best interests,” he said.

“Sometimes, the courts do side with the wishes and feelings of those who lack capacity, as when the Court of Appeal overturned a forced abortion ruling last year. But this is not a given, as the courts may decide that the gravity of the situation ultimately outweighs the person’s wishes and feelings in determining their best interests.”

Wee, who was appointed as a member of the Pontifical Academy for Life in February, noted that the judge accepted four points advanced by the specialists. First, that a pregnancy in the near future would pose a serious health risk. Second, that the woman was likely to become pregnant again in the absence of contraception. Third, that the woman lacked the capacity to make decisions about contraception and, fourth, that she might not comply with the requirement for regular injections.

“On this basis, the judge concluded that an intrauterine contraceptive device (IUD) would be in the woman’s best interests,” he said.

“It is unfortunately easy to see contraception as a quick-fix solution — one that conveniently erases fertility from the picture, without seeking to address underlying questions of what is appropriate and responsible sexual behavior, and what social support can be provided for vulnerable people.”

He added: “It is odd that there is no consideration of whether the woman is mentally capable of consenting to sex, even though the judge accepted evidence that the woman does not have capacity to make decisions about contraception.”

“Consent to intercourse and consent to contraception are surely intimately linked, and if there is any doubt about the woman’s capacity to have genuinely consensual intercourse then this raises serious questions of abuse and other safeguarding issues relating to any previous, ongoing and future sexual relationships. Contraception does not solve, and may even entrench, such a dangerous situation.”

Wee concluded: “Additionally, one must not forget that IUDs can prevent the implantation of an embryo, thus leading to the loss of human life. It is therefore especially morally inappropriate for a court to intervene in this heavy-handed way.” 

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