Death of a women denied foetal termination

[hawkwing_lb]

So there is this thing. This thing is that Ireland has legal precedent which permits abortion in cases where there is a "real and substantial" risk to a woman's life. (See Attorney General v. X.) But there is no legislation which clarifies this precedent, and no guidance for doctors, who are open to prosecution under an Offences Against the Person Act of 1861:

Whosoever shall unlawfully supply or procure any poison or other noxious thing, or any instrument or thing whatsoever, knowing that the same is intended to be unlawfully used or employed with intent to procure the miscarriage of any woman, whether she be or be not with child, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor...

The punishment upon conviction under this Victorian law, for doctors found guilty, is penal servitude for three years. Women found guilty of inducing their own miscarriages are liable for penal servitude for life. I'm not familiar with the history of prosecution under this law. However, Article 40.3.3 of the Constitution has been used to deny full human rights and freedoms to women.

Today, the Irish Times carries the story of Salvita Halapannavar, a 31-year-ago dentist from India living in Galway, who died - most likely - as a result of septicaemia contracted during a miscarriage of her 17-week-foetus. Her cervix had been dilated for three days. She was in agony. Her foetus, she was told, would not survive. The consultant at Galway University Hospital said, "As long as there is a foetal heartbeat, we can't do anything."

"The doctor told us the cervix was fully dilated, amniotic fluid was leaking and unfortunately the baby wouldn’t survive.” The doctor, he says, said it should be over in a few hours. There followed three days, he says, of the foetal heartbeat being checked several times a day.

“Savita was really in agony. She was very upset, but she accepted she was losing the baby. When the consultant came on the ward rounds on Monday morning Savita asked if they could not save the baby could they induce to end the pregnancy. The consultant said, ‘As long as there is a foetal heartbeat we can’t do anything’.

“Again on Tuesday morning, the ward rounds and the same discussion. The consultant said it was the law, that this is a Catholic country. Savita [a Hindu] said: ‘I am neither Irish nor Catholic’ but they said there was nothing they could do."

Irish Times, 14 November 2012.


For twenty years, successive governments in this country have delayed and delayed and delayed introducing legislation to safeguard the lives and human dignity of women. Even after the European Court of Human Rights heard the 2009 petition of the women known as A, B, and C - and ruled that Ireland's lack of provision for legal abortion in cases of medical necessity was a failure of human rights - the present government continues to display a puling, mean, vile moral cowardice.

If the failure of medical intervention in Ms. Halapannavar's case is found to have contributed to her death - and I cannot see how it may not be found to be so - Irish governments for the last twenty years bear part of the responsibility for her death. (The other part rests with the doctor who failed of their responsibility due to a willful misunderstanding of legal precedent - or a moral cowardice that placed their career and religious faith above Ms. Halapannavar's life and health.)

(Catholic doctrine is not on this point clear today - The Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services forbid the termination of a viable foetus, but say little of the termination of non-viable but still alive ones, though I suspect few doctors have actually read the things) - but historically, the life of the mother outweighs the life of the foetus, and in a church to which tradition is so important, the historical dimension should be important.)

This is a shame and a stain and a disgrace on this nation. Please write to Irish embassies and Irish parliamentary representatives: THIS SHOULD NOT HAVE HAPPENED. THIS SHOULD NOT HAPPEN AGAIN.

Comments

[http://users.livejournal.com/la_marquise_de_/]

Just awful: this surely calls for an investigation, at the very least.

[hawkwing-lb.livejournal.com]

The Health Services Executive are conducting one. However, my faith in their ability to make objective findings is, shall we say, sceptical.

[mevennen.livejournal.com]

I think you're right to be sceptical. This is an appalling case.

[athgarvan.livejournal.com]

"the life of the mother outweighs the life of the foetus"
Interesting in the light of last Saturday's referendum.

[hawkwing-lb.livejournal.com]

And what do you mean by that?

[between4walls.livejournal.com]

What struck me is the sheer unnecessary waste of it. She might have been better off in a country with horrific maternal mortality rates, a much worse healthcare system, and where most abortions performed are unsafe, just because the laws aren't this stupid. I know people who've had legal abortions in India. A close relative of mine was pretty much the top official on family planning there. The 19th century laws were repealed back in 1971. I'm pretty sure- and so, according to an interview with Savita Halapannavar's husband, is he- that she would have gotten the treatment she repeatedly requested there. The way Mr. Halapannavar put it was, "It has been a terrible few weeks, very hard to understand how this can happen in the 21st century, very hard to explain to her family. If it had happened in the UK or India, the whole thing would have been over in a few hours."

But in a first-world country where it's far safer to give birth, a country with universal healthcare and much greater resources, she was at best made to suffer unnecessarily and at worst killed. And yet politicians are content to pass on the consequences on to Supreme Court, to the ECHR, to the UK, most of all to the women themselves, rather than actually do their jobs and pass a law that reflects what the courts decided, but that might, God forbid, have political consequences for them!

(And honestly, that there was EVER an injunction in the case of a raped suicidal fourteen-year-old....)

About the doctors, I can imagine them thinking her health was endangered but not her life, and finding themselves in a legal gray area, b/c the case law as far as I know doesn't consider a threat to the health of the mother sufficient. And then things turned out worse than they thought. They still bear a lot of responsibility. The only mitigating theory I've seen suggested so far is if the miscarriage was a symptom of the infection that killed her, rather than the infection being acquired during the miscarriage. I guess we'll see when the inquiries are done. But even if it didn't kill her, this still looks like a really bad decision.

Will write to the embassy.

[hawkwing-lb.livejournal.com]

Yes. It is a heinous offence against human life and dignity, this. Shameful. Appalling. Enraging. Disgusting. I do not have the words to express my anger.