Bernard M Dickens
Abstract not available
Dickens BM. The ‘conscience clause’ and the law on abortion. Nurs Times. 1974;70(25):968-969
Category: Abortion
(Correspondence) Attitudes to Abortion
John Stallworthy
Extract
In the reorganized Health Service it should be easier than hitherto for adequate teams to provide a comnprehensive service in obstetrics and gynaecology if there is the necessary financial support. High ethical standards, conscience, and differing religious beliefs, when associated with freedom, of thought and expression within the fellowship of a team, can prove enriching for the doctors and therefore beneficial to the patients.
Stallworthy J. (Correspondence) Attitudes to Abortion. Br Med J. 1974 Jun 01;2(5917):501.
(Correspondence) Attitudes to Abortion
NA Chisholm
Extract
Conscience must be seen to have its positive face. The “conscience clause” cannot be regarded as merely a negative one allowing only the right of abstention from helping the distressed. It also entitles those who are humanly concerned enough to wish to do so the right to ensure, within the law, proper medical help for those who would otherwise pass into the hands of the backstreet abortionists, with all the awful consequences of this that Professor McLaren and I, and all our generation, know very well.
Chisholm N. (Correspondence) Attitudes to Abortion. Br Med J. 1974 May 25;2(5916):441.
(Correspondence) Attitudes to Abortion
Rex Binning
Extract
It is suggested by Professor H. C. McLaren (12 May, p. 329) that one termination of pregnancy every three months is all that a consultant “practising modern obstetrics, offering compassion and advice” should be doing. This statement is, with respect, that of someone living in another world.
Binning R. (Correspondence) Attitudes to Abortion. Br Med J. 1974;2(5916):441.
(Points from Letters) Attitudes to Abortion
TJ Hypher
Extract
. . . I would submit that those who have the courage to stand by their convictions against substantial pressures will be among our most highly principled colleagues. We cannot afford to be without them, and indeed they and both our profession and our patients require that you give them your strongest support. You may not agree with their opinions, but if you do not champion their principles then we shall be in a sorry plight when each subsequent wave of emotion effects an Act in some kindred field.
Hypher TJ. (Points from Letters) Attitudes to Abortion. Br Med J. 1974 May 25;2(5916):448.
(Correspondence) Attitudes to Abortion
GS Banwell
Extract
The right to conscientious objection is embodied in the Abortion Act, and the Lane Committee has not suggested that this section should be amended. It is difficult to understand why you advocate that a consultant gynaecologist, alone among surgical specialists, should be compelled to perform a particular operation other than on the basis of his own judgement. The right to conscientious objection to the performance of therapeutic abortion continues to be the law of the land. . . But it must remain the duty of the medical profession to protest that therapeutic abortion involves the destruction of human life.
Banwell G. (Correspondence) Attitudes to Abortion. Br Med J. 1974;2(5915):383. Available from:
(Correspondence) Attitudes to Abortion
JS Scott
Extract
You suggest that while a conscience clause was “manifestly essential” seven years ago, now “the situation has changed.”In what way? The extermination chambers of the Third Reich were no less of an affront to civilization at the end than they were at the beginning of their existence; the few who continued to speak against them were every bit as right ultimately as initially. Lest it be said that this is quite remote from the British abortion situation, I record that I have been faced with a healthy and affluent young woman demanding abortion”because the father is a Jew.” That the abortion was carried out, though not by me, may give some of your readers pause for thought.
Scott J. (Correspondence) Attitudes to Abortion. Br Med J. 1974 May 11;2(5914):329-330.
(Correspondence) Attitudes to Abortion
David M Jenkins
Extract
The reason that doctors, nurses, and patients find abortion “distasteful” has not changed. . . I have little doubt that people who find abortion”distasteful” will now not go into gynaecology. The consequence will be that a specialty never very rich in grey matter will become deficient in character as well. And who will suffer? Your implication that we gynaecologists are unsympathetic to our patients is just untrue. Neither are we susceptible to the temptations of courting easy popularity.
Jenkins DM. (Correspondence) Attitudes to Abortion. Br Med J. 1974 May 11;2(5914):330. Available from:
(Editorial) Attitudes to Abortion
British Medical Journal
Extract
Abortion for a wide range of indications is, however, now an established part of conventional medical practice in Britain and the committee seemed a little impatient with those who would not recognize that fact. A conscience clause was manifestly essential when the Act came in, since many gynaecologists had sincere moral or ethical objections to abortion on some of the grounds introduced by the new Act. Seven years later the situation has changed. As the committee points out,the number and attitude of gynaecologists are important in determining the level of service which can be provided, so that “it is inevitable that the health authorities should prefer for appointment to certain posts those who see abortion as properly part of clinical gynaecological practice.” What this implies is that a young doctor may find some difficulty in taking up a career in gynaecology in the N.H.S. if he is fundamentally opposed on ethical grounds to abortion in the terms of the Act.
BMJ. (Editorial) Attitudes to Abortion. Br Med J. 1974;2(5910):69-70.
(Correspondence) Abortion and the pregnant teenager
EH Curran
Extract
The fact remains that, however technically safe and socially acceptable induced abortion becomes, it is a destructive procedure with some onerous implications. . . We even tolerate the ridiculous and completely unsupportable notion that a fetus is parasitic until 20 weeks and somehow human after that time. It is my hope that we shall reconsider our age-old pledge to preserve life and relieve pain and not sell out to the madness of social expediency.
Curran E. (Correspondence) Abortion and the pregnant teenager. Can Med Assoc J. 1974 Feb 02;110(3):261.