
blogs


Developing Health Course – final reflections
The Developing Health Course is over, and I am back at my desk. What a privilege it has been…

A new IVF milestone
Thirty-four years after the first test tube baby, Louise Brown, was born in 1978 it is estimated that…

BMA corrects Lord Falconer’ s misrepresentation of its position on ‘assisted dying’
Yesterday I drew attention to Lord Falconer’s false claim in the Times that the British Medical Association…

Why legalising assisted suicide for anyone at all will inevitably lead to incremental extension
Pro-euthanasia activists always make a great play of how their proposals to help people kill themselves…

Pigs and plasters
I always enjoy week two of the Developing Health Course. By now we have got to know one another,…

Former Lord Chancellor misrepresents BMA position
The Times today carries an article (£) promoting Lord Falconer’s new assisted suicide bill which…

The legalisation of assisted suicide – what’s money got to do with it?
Today, according to the Sunday Times, Lord Falconer (pictured) will publish his new bill on…

Minding the gap – Developing Health Course 2012
We are half way through the Developing Health Course, after a fantastic first week. We have learned…

Abortion counselling gets BMA backing
This week has seen some important voting on abortion and assisted dying when the British Medical Association…

BMA Ethics Debate – great results on both abortion and euthanasia
This morning the British Medical Association Annual Representative Meeting debated two motions on abortion…

Why the BMA should not go neutral on assisted suicide and euthanasia
This Wednesday, 27 June, the British Medical Association Annual Representative Meeting (ARM) will vote…
Two giants are approaching; are we ready for them?
On November 23rd a radical bill to decriminalise abortion and impose it on Northern Ireland was stopped in its tracks thanks to opposition led by Christopher Chope MP. The status quo is preserved for now – but it’s no time for us to rest on our laurels. The Royal College of General Practitioners has just stated: “The College will now work with […]
Surrogacy: A selfless gift… or something more?
Surrogacy is often portrayed as a compassionate and beautiful act, a selfless gift, where a woman carries a child for a couple or an individual who are unable to have their own children. On the surface it appears to be a great act of kindness. However, beyond the superficial, there are troubling aspects of surrogacy […]
New Abortion Advice to Schools: Fact or Fiction?
The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (RCOG) has produced a new factsheet on abortion to support Relationships and Sex Education in secondary schools. This ‘aims to ensure that professionals involved in educating young people on abortion do so ‘…with honest and medically accurate information…[which] distinguishes between fact and fiction.’ Since this new factsheet is […]
‘Abortion does not cause mental illness’. Discuss.
A new factsheet produced for schools by the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (RCOG) and the Faculty of Sexual and Reproductive Healthcare (FSRH) states as one of the ‘myth buster‘ headlines that ‘abortion does not cause mental illness’. Underneath the headline they explain: Successive studies and research reviews have demonstrated that the experience of […]
A stark warning to UK doctors from Canada
A recent legal ruling in Canada is a strong warning for British medical professionals who conscientiously object to involvement in abortion, or who would do so with assisted suicide if it were ever legalised. In 2018 the Ontario Superior Court ruled that healthcare professionals who refuse to carry out abortions (and euthanasia) must refer patients […]
After Three Decades The Department of Health Recognises Fetal Pain
The eighteenth century philosopher, Jeremy Bentham, wrote of animals: ‘The question is not Can they reason?, not Can they talk?, but Can they suffer?’ Professors Glover and Fisk, in their 2005 paper ‘Fetal Pain: Implications for research and practice’ say that this caused a change in attitude towards animals and their treatment that is continuing […]
The risks of neutrality on assisted suicide – lessons from abroad
Medicine has held a long-established opposition to assistance with suicide. Ira Byock, an American Palliative care physician, believes this is necessary so that: ‘the power of medicine is not used against vulnerable people’. One of the roles of medicine is the need to balance our duties to the individual with our duties to society. This is […]
Why the Royal College of Physicians will go ‘neutral’ on assisted suicide and why that matters
The Royal College of Physicians (RCP) is going to poll its 35,000 members to ask whether ‘they would help a terminally ill patient to die and whether the law should be changed to allow assisted dying.’ Why, despite the RCP polling all its members just a few years ago with the same question, has it […]
A good day to bury bad news? New CANH guidance released by BMA
When Jo Moore infamously sent a memo saying in effect that 11 September 2001 was a good day to bury bad news, she inadvertently lifted the veil on a time honoured practice of releasing news and reports in the midst of major national or world events in the hope that the news media fail to […]
Is British aid money being spent on funding illegal abortions?
Soon after authorities in Kenya banned Marie Stopes Kenya from carrying out abortions in Kenya, Niger also ordered the closure of some centres run by Marie Stopes International (MSI) on the grounds that MSI was illegally performing abortions there. Kenya and Niger are not the first countries to become victims of the abortion giant. In […]
Marie Stopes guilty of carrying out illegal abortions…again
This week, it hit the headlines that authorities in Kenya have forbidden Marie Stopes International(MSI) from carrying out abortions in Kenya. The Kenya Medical Practitioners and Dentists Board (KMPDB) issued this order after it was noted that Marie Stopes was advertising abortion services, despite a prohibition on all abortion advertising. Earlier this year, the Kenya […]
Diana Johnson’s Bill could return women to the perils of ‘back street’ abortion days
Today, 23 October 2018, Diana Johnson MP introduced a Ten Minute Rule Bill to decriminalise abortion in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland (NI). The bill was given leave to proceed to a Second Reading by 208 votes to 123. (179 Labour MPs voted for the bill and 108 Tory MPs voted against so the vote […]