
blogs


Embryonic stem cells from cloned human embryos – six reasons for caution
The newspapers are full today of the news that scientists in the US state of Oregon have produced embryonic…

Joy, sorrow and satisfaction – medical mission in Ecuador
My own personal journey to becoming a medical missionary began when I finished secondary school and went…

It’s exam time! Can smart drugs make you smarter at this testing time?
While a cup of strong coffee is probably the choice of drink for most people studying for exams, perhaps…

The ‘Groningen protocol’ for euthanasia of disabled babies in the Netherlands
In an interview this morning on BBC Five Live (at 0705) on the Paul Lamb case (listen here) I was asked…

Don’t be fooled by Lord Falconer’s ‘modest’ assisted suicide proposals
Lord Falconer has finally announced that his long awaited assisted suicide bill will be tabled in the…

Doctors should not be forced to provide emergency contraception
The Independent has run the story of a ‘Christian-run NHS GP surgery’ which has apparently ‘attracted…

Several leading bioethicists defend the practice of infanticide this week in leading medical journal
In February 2012 two bioethicists provoked international outrage with an article advocating infanticide.
Writing…

Marie Fleming loses Supreme Court appeal challenging ban on assisted suicide
A 59-year-old Irish woman today lost her Supreme Court challenge to the ban on assisted suicide.
Marie…

What the UK needs to learn from the worldwide Church
Last week there was a meeting between David Cameron and leaders of major UK NGOs on the process to find…

GMC and RCM must now move urgently to review their abortion guidance in light of Glasgow midwives court ruling
Two Roman Catholic midwives have today won a landmark legal battle to avoid taking any part in abortion…

Losing trust – why immunisation programmes fail
What do South Wales, North Nigeria and Northwest Pakistan have in common? They all have outbreaks of…
Why helping a few women will harm many more: the untold cost of creating three parent embryos
It seems ironic that while ten or so women may be helped each year to have embryos free from mitochondrial disease (yes, the numbers are that small as a Government ‘estimate’ admits), many hundreds of other women will be put at real risk of harm to help them achieve this. There is a deafening silence […]
Why Lord Carey is so desperately wrong about legalising assisted suicide
Lord Carey, former Archbishop of Canterbury, has surprisingly come out today in favour of Lord Falconer’s Assisted Dying Bill which is due to have its second reading in the House of Lords on Friday 18 July. Falconer advocates licensing doctors to dispense lethal drugs to mentally competent adults with a life expectancy of less than six months and a […]
Restoring or Enhancing
If you love sport, then this weekend offered a surfeit of riches! We were spoiled for choice, with football from Brazil, F1 from Silverstone, the opening stages of the Tour de France across Yorkshire’s moors packed with 2.6 million spectators and, of course, the Wimbledon finals. Something for everyone! Our household was gripped by the […]
Oregon – steady annual increase in assisted suicide cases sounds warning to UK
Lord Falconer wants to legalise assisted suicide for adults who are mentally competent and have less than six months to live based on the ‘Oregon model’. Since assisted suicide was legalised in Oregon there has been a steady annual increase in the number of prescriptions written for lethal drugs and in numbers of people killing […]
Twelve reasons to think twice about going the Oregon route on assisted suicide
Lord Falconer’s Assisted Dying Bill, due for a second reading in the House of Lords on 18 July, is purportedly based on the US state of Oregon’s Death with Dignity Act (DWDA). Dignity in Dying, the former Voluntary Euthanasia Society, who are backing Falconer, claim that everything is wonderful in Oregon. But is that really true? Over […]
Freedom of conscience in medicine is under sustained attack but is worth fighting for
I have previously highlighted the case of two Glasgow midwives who were disciplined by their NHS Trust for refusing to participate in abortion. Their Trust was found to be in the wrong by the Scottish Court of Appeal and the case has been referred to the UK Supreme Court where a further hearing is still awaited. A single […]
Might the large disparity in premature birth rates between black and white women be partly explained by abortion?
Prematurity is associated with a wide variety of health risks. In the UK, 7.8% of babies are born prematurely (60,000 per year) and this number is on the rise. The total cost of preterm birth to NHS is £2.9 billion a year, equivalent to that of smoking, alcohol and obesity. Reducing the rate of preterm […]
Three-parent embryos – an orange light doesn’t mean Go!
Any sub-heading to this blog post could ask a further question: ‘why should we be concerned about this issue anyway? After all, what’s not to like about new techniques that could stop a horrible disease, that seem to be safe (enough), that only involve manipulating a tiny bit of DNA on a tiny embryo […]
Why are men more in favour of abortion?
Most people assume that abortion garners more support from women than men. This is probably because being pro-abortion is seen as a pillar of feminism and calls to reduce abortion limits are usually attacked as being, in some way, a ‘war on women’. As one feminist claimed recently, any stance which seeks to limit women’s […]
Offer of sex change drugs to nine year olds should make us question therapists’ ideological presuppositions
Children as young as nine are to be prescribed drugs which delay the onset of puberty as the first step towards a sex change operation (Mail on Sunday and Daily Telegraph). Doctors at the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust said a trial of the treatment on ‘gender dysphoria’ patients aged 12 to 14 had […]
Saving the NHS
Last Thursday the think tank Res Publica launched a report into the state of the National Health Service, and proposed that a greater role for mutual societies might be key in building a sustainable health service for the future. We are all familiar with the diagnosis – we have a growing elderly population, a dwindling […]
Talking about death – the importance of openness about one of life’s certainties
About two thirds of the way into Alexander Payne’s 2011 film The Descendants, Matt King (played by George Clooney) walks calmly into the hospital room of his comatose wife, Elizabeth. He closes the door gently and then proceeds to excoriate her for controlling and messing up the lives of everyone around her. This powerful scene […]