Journal Correspondence Archives - Page 22 of 26 - Protection of Conscience Project Library

(Correspondence) Abortion and Conscience

Alan Sanderson

British Medical Journal, BMJ — British Medical Journal

Extract
Dr. Myre Sim (4 November, p. 297) exhorts those of us without religious objections to abortion to heed our medical consciences. He is so convinced of the rightness of his views that he brands any doctor who acts differently as lacking in conscience. I do not agree with this assumption. Many highly conscientious doctors favour abortion on social grounds. . . . For most of us it takes courage to recommend or to perform an abortion. It is an operation from which we shrink with a natural abhorrence. How much easier it is to do nothing, especially if inaction can be condoned by invoking ” medical conscience.”

Sanderson A. (Correspondence) Abortion and Conscience. Br Med J. 1967 Dec 09;4(5579):621.

(Correspondence) Abortion and Conscience

Peter Darby

Extract
Dr. Sim quite rightly feels that the doctor who advises a termination of pregnancy should have a clear conscience that the dangers threatening the pregnant woman are real. Should he not feel that the doctor who, advises against termination of pregnancy also has a clear conscience that no dangers threaten the patient ?

Darby P. (Correspondence) Abortion and Conscience. Br Med J. 1967 December 02;4(5578):549.

(Correspondence) Abortion and Conscience

Myre Sim

Extract
One point seems clear, and that is the new law will permit a doctor to refuse to recommend or perform an abortion on grounds of conscience. This clause was intended to protect those doctors (and nurses) with strong religious objections to abortion. There are, however, conscientious objections other than religious. There is a medical conscience which dictates that one should not interrupt the process of human life unless there is good evidence that such a measure is entirely justified in order to avert a dangerous situation. . . That the law makes it permissive for doctors who have not got this medical conscience does not remove from the doctor who possesses one the right to act according to it. It would be intolerable for a doctor to be pressurized into what he considers to be bad medical practice in order to conform with a new law.

Sim M. (Correspondence) Abortion and Conscience. Br Med J. 1967 Nov 4;4(5574):297.

(Correspondence) Abortion bill

G.B. Leyton

Extract

As a reader of the British Medical Journal for more than a quarter of a century I feel compelled to write and say how much I deplore the recent trend in your leading articles of allowing other considerations than the welfare of the patient to influence your reasoning and conclusions. . .

Leyton GB. Abortion Bill. Br Med J. 1967 May 20; 2(5550): 511

(Correspondence) Abortion bill

Gareth Lloyd

Extract

Dr. W. J. Stanley (22 April, p. 247) raises the question of the legal position of the doctor refusing to accede to the termination of a pregnancy on medical grounds. Let us be clear in our minds that, once the Bill becomes law, any doctor refusing to consider abortion on medical or social grounds could be liable to be prosecuted for negligence. . .

Lloyd G. (Correspondence) Abortion Bill. Br Med J. 1967 May 20; 2(5550): 511

(Correspondence) Abortion Bill

Myre Sim

Extract
Under the title of Medical Termination of Pregnancy, this Bill would expose to legal action a surgeon who refused to abort on sound clinical grounds, and therefore in good faith, yet his defence would be stronger if he claimed he refused to abort on grounds of conscience.

Sim M. (Correspondence) Abortion Bill. Br Med J. 1967 May 20;2(5550):511.

(Correspondence) Abortion Bill

WJ Stanley

Extract
It has gradually dawned upon the politicians that a doctor might have objections, and at a very late stage a ” conscience clause” has been included, but only against strong opposition. . . . The clause allows for objection on moral or religious grounds, but how does the doctor stand if he objects on clinical grounds ? As a psychiatrist, patients are referred to me for termination of pregnancy, usually the sole grounds for referral being that the patient is depressed as a result of having an unwanted pregnancy. Many psychiatrists consider that there are no, or virtually no, psychiatric grounds for termination of pregnancy, but how will the psychiatrist stand when the new Bill becomes law ? If he does not consider that there are adequate clinical grounds for termination of pregnancy, is he liable to be sued for negligence? The situation must have no parallel in the whole of the history of medicine, and clarification of the doctor’s position is, in my opinion, urgently needed.

Stanley W. (Correspondence) Abortion Bill. Br Med Journal. 1967 Apr 22;2(5546):247.

(Correspondence) Termination of Pregnancy Bill

J Martyn Thomas

Extract
Of course, one must accord anybody the right to act according to his or her conscience, but where a conscientious objection precludes normal medical practice, it is surely right to ask whether it is proper to inflict one’s views on one’s patients. While fully aware that it might provoke serious objections on many grounds, I would suggest that each regional hospital board has a duty to ensure that situations such as these, where the entire consultant establishment in a specialty refuses for conscientious reasons to follow accepted practice, to the possible detriment of patients, do not in future arise.

Thomas JM. (Correspondence) Termination of Pregnancy Bill. Br Med J. 1967;1(5538):502. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1840881/pdf/brmedj02124-0088a.pdf

(Correspondence) Termination of pregnancy bill

A.M. Rankin

Extract

The B.M.A. Council was not unanimous in approving the joint B.M.A./ R.C.O.G. report on Mr. Steel’s Bill. I for one spoke against and voted against acceptance on precisely the two grounds which Dr. P. A. T. Wood (4 February, p. 299) finds objectionable. . .

Rankin AM. Termination of pregnancy bill (Letters). Br Med J. 1967 February 18; 1(5537): 426.

(Correspondence) Termination of Pregnancy Bill

WM Capper

Extract
I have during recent years encountered two patients who when asked about anxiety recalled abortions that had been carried out 20 or more years before. There are few people so miserable as the childless menopausal woman who bitterly recalls the abortion of her first child. Unfortunately the human conscience has a long memory.

Capper W. (Correspondence) Termination of Pregnancy Bill. Br Med J. 1967 Feb 18;1(5537):426.