get off your high horse Melinda.

Pro-choice or Anti-abortion, there does not seem to be much of a problem with the proposal.

We have cooling off periods for other large financial decisions, which child rearing is (and do not imply this trivialise childbirth or abortion in stating this, please!).

However, one element of the article should be emphasises and enforced – the statement that it should be independent counselling made available.

That means, no happy-clapping skewed, self-interested book publishing person or groups, nor for that matter, abortion employed, funded or even affiliated ‘suspect’ counsellors.

Independent, non-judgemental, middle of the road counsellors, who have no opinion and are not swayed or deterred, one way or the other, regarding the choices or otherwise with regard to abortion.

Let us see who objects to this then…

kenny...what an unreasonable comment to a balanced article

"Late-term abortions carry serious risk of physical and psychological complications."
So two-weeks-later-term abortions are even worse.

"Women have a right to know: no one benefits when the facts are missing."
So tell them, surely that doesn't take two weeks. And yeah, counseling is available and doctors who don't inform patients are open to negligence claims.

"Many women are coerced by others, bullied and railroaded into an unwanted abortion."
Reducing the liberty of those who aren't coerced in order to "buy time" for them to find help that are seems like an incredibly unfair and inefficient solution. Here's an idea: instead of giving them 2 weeks to find help, ensure a proper amount of help is available easily and all the time.

Good article.

Good suggestion by Reason too; if the counselling comes from a neutral, then pressure and coercion are avoided.

I also think that it should be ensured that these neutrals have all the up-to-date research on the nature and impact of abortion on all levels (financial, emotional, societal, etc.)

I recognise the difference between early terminations and late term abortions and I agree that counselling is extremely important for all terminations with the longer the term increasing the degree of importance.
Regarding the 'cooling off period'I have a problem if that period is imposed as mandatory against the wishes of the woman.
I also believe that the 'ideal' referral of non-biased counsellors would be well nigh impossible to achieve. Abortion has become such an emotive issue that has polarised observers with a pro or anti bias.
It comes down to the woman's choice. She deserves to know all about health risks both physical and psychological. Given all the facts and then permitted to make her decision free from coersion

The author is working with a minority of women who regret their abortions, and she doesn't speak for the majority of Australian women.

The author supposes that the woman with the unwanted pregnancy has easy access to doctors. This may be so in Toorak and Double Bay but women in the outer metropolitan and rural areas often have to wait for a week for a doctors appointment. Add to that the young women who still live under the parental roof.

So time is marching on, the woman realises she is pregnant, or the foetus is deformed, she makes an appointment then has time to cool off, then makes another appointment for the procedure.

At the moment city women in Victoria usually have a 24 hour cooling off period imposed. Are you suggesting a 3 month cooling off period?

Thanks Melinda.
It's time for the abortion industry and it's supporters(they like to be called pro-choice but what choices do they offer?) to get over being in denial of the effects of abortion: the taking of innocent human life, exposing some women to an increased risk of breast cancer, exposing women to mental health problems, causing infertility etc.
All women troubled by a pregnancy should be able to receive help and good counselling from a source not connected with an abortion provider or an abortion referrer under the guise of a quick fix by way of an abortion.
Keep up the good work, Melinda.
from Aloysius.

This article isn't about caring for women and their health, it's about putting obstacles between a woman and an abortion provider that may buy the Catholic lobby time to change a woman's mind.

This is not about religion, adverse outcomes, 'unbiased' counselling, book publishers, egos or funding.
This is about a woman and her unborn child ... there needs to be time for the realisation of a truth.
An in-office ultrasound gives the woman all the unbiased facts she needs.

Best comment I read in a while, Dr Mac. Thanks.

Pike's plan proposal is definately correct. Young woman can be pressured into not following through with the birth of a child for a number of wrong reasons. This plan will allow women to be educated in their choice, and even allow a voice for some (which is what some young women need & want.)

The best way to make sure more abortions are late term abortions? Make it harder to get an abortion.
Giving women access to information and choices is fine, as long as that information is actually unbiased and offers all the alternatives, pushing any kind of personal ideological, moral or religious barrel is not helpful, and probably cruel.
But mandating, I repeat mandating, a "cooling off" period is patronising and insensitive. I remember 25 odd years ago when I had an unwanted pregnancy, all I wanted, all the way through my body, was not to be pregnant any more. To have some group of other people telling me I had to wait and "think" about my decision for a week or two more would have been beyond endurance. I knew perfectly well what I wanted to do, and I did it, without, sorry Melinda, a moments regret ever since. All I felt after the abortion was relief. Nobody wants to have an abortion, but sometimes they don't want to be pregnant more.
As I have pointed out on this site previously, I still do not regret my abortion. How could I? If I had that child, I wouldn't have had the two much wanted children I had later. It is important to realise that abortions may deny one child life, but they sometimes give other, later, much wanted children the chance that they never would have got otherwise. This is never taken into account.

You are spot on enaj.
Anti abortion ideologues have no intention of condoning abortion. The notion of 'cooling off 'periods is precisely a stalling ploy.
On the other hand, pro choice supporters advocate 'choice'.........
The woman's choice, nobody elses.

In a 'debate' as polarised as this, it would do us all well to remember that, as in any conflict, there is truth and bias in both 'sides', and the answer falls somewhere in between. However, we should not fall into the trap of believing that the 'side' we don't identify with has nothing at all to offer.

An interesting judgement that sneaked under most peoples' radar was passed down by the NSW Court of Criminal Appeal in March this year.

It is the matter of: R v David John IBY [2005] NSWCCA 178 which involves the court reinterpreting the meaning of 'born alive' from the older rule that required the baby to breath of its own, to a baby breathing with artificial assistance, such as a respirator:

The key paragraphs being:

64 The context in which the rule arises for present consideration is a context in which the Appellant wishes to avoid criminal responsibility for manslaughter of a baby which was injured as a late term foetus, indeed was fully developed in perfect condition and within a week or two of actual birth. In the current state of medical technology and with the extremely low rate of stillbirths in the Australian community, the born alive rule, if it is to survive at all, should continue to be applied, as Ellis DCJ did, so that any sign of life after birth is sufficient. This happens to be consistent with the authorities.

65 It is also the approach which conforms best with contemporary conditions. It is now virtually certain that a newborn baby which shows any sign of life would have lived but for the conduct, said to constitute manslaughter or dangerous driving, inflicted on the baby late in the mother’s pregnancy.

The Judges did not apply the WHO definition:

“Live birth is the complete expulsion or extraction from its mother of a product of conception, irrespective of the duration of pregnancy, which, after such separation, breathes or shows any other evidence of life, such as beating of the heart, pulsation of the umbilical cord, or definite movement of voluntary muscles, whether or not the umbilical cord has been cut or the placenta is attached; each product of such a birth is considered live born.”

The full judgement can be found at:

http://www.lawlink.nsw.gov.au/scjudgments/2005nswcca.nsf/a16acdaf45f305714a256724003189f5/4d344cd3699e4c55ca256ff8007e5398?OpenDocument

One interpretation that is capable of being made is that a third trimester termination, where the child shows signs of life, can be considered manslaughter

Hamlet, making Rh486 available to women who want it will avoid the need for such terminations as you describe having to be performed so late.

Melinda.

I agree with Kenny.

Get off your high horse and live your life as you see fit allowing others to do they same and make up their OWN minds.

We have read your comments> Thankyou.

Now the larger majority do not agree with you.

I respect your thoughts.

Do the same for others.

Its that simply

Butt Out unless its you