The report of the review into the Health (Regulation of Termination of Pregnancy) Act 2018 is due to be laid on the desk of Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly by 7th February 2023. Pro Life Campaign (PLC) said:
“The review must take into account the urgent need to provide women in unplanned pregnancies with positive alternatives to abortion. The HSE hotline ‘MyOptions’ requires regulation to ensure that counsellors are actively providing women in unplanned pregnancies with a range of options aside from abortion, particularly help with continuing with their pregnancy and information on adoption services. No woman should ever feel like she has no option but to have an abortion. In the PLC’s 2023 pre-budget submission, we called for a revamp of the social welfare system to tackle the socio-economic roots of abortion. In a rich country like Ireland, no parent should ever feel like they cannot afford to have and raise a baby.”
“The report must also consider the issue of foetal pain relief. The latest medical and scientific literature indicates that unborn children experience pain, possibly as early as 12 weeks gestation. Performing late-term abortions without administering foetal pain relief, as is happening in Ireland, is allowing needless harm to continue. A December 2022 report from the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists in Britain stated that pain relief is now being administered as mixed practice nationwide. This precedent should inform Irish abortion policy. Foetal pain relief would be a small but meaningful measure to alleviate suffering for the unborn child in late-term abortions.”
