PRO-LIFE NEWS IN BRIEF

By Liz Townsend

West Virginia Hospital Rejects Widening of Abortion Policy

The board of United Hospital Center (UHC) in Clarksburg, West Virginia, rejected a plan to perform abortions for fetal abnormality. By an 8-7 vote December 17, the board listened to an outpouring of community opposition to the plan and voted to keep the existing abortion policy in place, according to the Clarksburg Exponent-Telegram.

"Our policy will remain the same. We will not perform [elective] abortions, even in the very rare case where a lethal fetal abnormality exists," UHC President Bruce Carter told the Exponent-Telegram. "We respect the community's values on this issue from a philosophical and religious standpoint, and the board has voted accordingly."

UHC's abortion policy allows "emergency" abortions only if the mother's life is in danger, the newspaper reported.

Karen Cross, executive director of West Virginians for Life, told NRL News that there was a huge public outcry once the proposed policy change was announced in December. Pro-lifers stressed that performing abortions for fetal abnormality is not the healthiest way to deal with such heartbreaking conditions.

"We tried to make it clear that you don't have to kill a baby who's going to die," Cross told NRL News. "The best way is to help the family cope with the loss of this baby, whether through perinatal hospice or other programs. Abortion would only add guilt to the grief the family will already feel."

Nitschke Brings Suicide Machine Parts from United States to Australia

After speaking at a Hemlock Society conference in San Diego, Australian euthanasia activist Philip Nitschke obtained the parts needed to assemble his patented COGen suicide machine and brought them back into his home country, Australian news agency AAP reported.

Despite a new law banning the exporting or importing of machines used to commit suicide, Australian customs officials allowed Nitschke to bring his machine into the country because it was disassembled at the time, according to AAP.

Nitschke described the questioning from customs officials as he exited his plane in Sydney January 20, AAP reported. "As I was taken aside today, they said: 'Are you carrying any devices that can be used to assist suicide?'

"I said: 'I'm carrying bits and pieces of the one we built over in America.' They had a look at it and they said: 'Well, these are just bits and pieces' and that seemed to be enough to let me go."

Nitschke previously attempted to bring a complete machine onto the plane as he was leaving Sydney January 9. Customs officials cited the new law and seized the machine, AAP reported. Nitschke had planned to demonstrate the machine, which was developed using funding from the Hemlock Society, at the conference.

The COGen machine consists of a canister that delivers pure carbon monoxide, which a person intending to commit suicide could breathe in and suffocate to death, according to CNSNews. Nitschke specifically developed it so the suicidal person alone could operate it, avoiding prosecution for assisted suicide for anyone who would have helped the person die.

"It has all the essential elements of being simple, transportable and the patients use it themselves," Hemlock Society founder Derek Humphry told the Associated Press. "This type of machine cuts out the legal risk."

At the conference, Nitschke praised convicted murderer Jack Kevorkian as a "hero," according to the San Diego Union-Tribune. "Look, he might have made some mistakes," Nitschke said, the newspaper reported. "But, hell, did he move the movement forward? Of course he did. Did he internationalize the movement? Of course he did."

Euthanasia opponents, demonstrating outside the conference, told reporters that assisted suicide and suicide devices prey on vulnerable people who need help, not death.

"Our main concern is that people will think suicide is a legitimate option for dealing with their problems," demonstrator Cheryl Sullenger told CNSNews. "If this machine is made available, I think what we're going to look at is a human tragedy. In a moment of depression or a time when they're experiencing some physical problems [people] may take advantage of the option of suicide.

"We think that people should be able to get the help they need so they can enjoy the gift of life instead of throwing that gift away."

New Research Explores Early Days of Fetal Development

According to a report in the journal Science, scientists at the University of California at San Francisco (UCSF) Medical Center have identified a protein that enables the newly fertilized unborn baby to implant in her mother's uterus. The baby (at this stage referred to as an embryo by scientists) and the lining of the uterus both secrete a protein called L-selectin. The protein molecules on each then attach to one another, forming a strong bond that locks them together, according to the Associated Press (AP).

"It's like a tennis ball rolling across a surface covered in syrup," Susan Fisher, professor of anatomy at UCSF Medical Center and co-author of the study, told the London Times. "The embryo's journey along the uterine wall is arrested by the sticky interaction."

Fisher said that the new findings could help treat a main cause of miscarriage. "Only 50 to 60 percent of all conceptions advance beyond 20 weeks," she told the AP, "and of pregnancies that are lost, 75 percent represent a failure of implantation."

The research sheds new light on previously murky aspects of reproduction. Scientists have long known that in a successful pregnancy the fertilized egg emerges from the Fallopian tube and then attaches to the uterus, but they did not know exactly how it is accomplished.

The UCSF researchers took samples of the endometrial lining of the uterus before, during, and after the time when implantation could occur, the London Times reported. They found that "carbohydrates that interact with L-selectin were highly enriched when the womb was ready to nourish a fetus," according to the Times. Examinations of cells from a six-day-old embryo showed that L-selectin is also present in high concentration just when needed to attach to the uterus.

"These results suggest that L-selectin mediates interactions with the uterus and that this adhesion mechanism may be critical to establishing human pregnancy," Fisher said, according to the Times.

The researchers plan to continue to study L-selectin, examining "how it is controlled and what it triggers afterward," United Press International reported.

Death Order for Schindler-Schiavo Postponed

An appeals court will hear further arguments in the case of Terri Schindler-Schiavo, postponing a judge's order that her feeding tube be removed on January 3, the Associated Press (AP) reported. Schindler-Schiavo, the Florida woman who has been disabled after suffering brain damage in 1990, will be allowed to live at least a few more months, since the 2nd District Court of Appeal scheduled oral arguments for April 4.

Circuit Judge George Greer announced November 22 that Schindler-Schiavo's husband Michael could withdraw his wife's feeding tube on January 3 at 3 p.m., according to the St. Petersburg Times. Her parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, strongly oppose the starvation and dehydration death of their daughter, and have been waging court battles with their son-in-law for almost five years.

Greer previously ordered Schindler-Schiavo's death in 2001. She was denied food and fluids for 60 hours beginning April 24 until her parents obtained a temporary injunction of the order, the Times reported.

In his November 2002 ruling, after hearing conflicting testimony from doctors on the possibility of Schindler-Schiavo's improvement, Greer again ordered her death. He stayed his order December 13, and the appeals court agreed to examine the case again, according to the AP.

Irish Police to File Assisted Suicide Charges Against Two Americans

Irish officials are expected to begin extradition proceedings and prosecution of two American men on charges of assisting in the suicide of a physically healthy woman, the Observer reported.

Rosemary Toole, 49, paid for Rev. George Exoo and Thomas McGurrin of West Virginia to travel to Ireland and help her kill herself in January 2002, according to the Observer. The two men are affiliated with a group called "Compassionate Chaplaincy," which claims to have assisted with more than 100 deaths, the Sunday Telegraph reported.

Toole was apparently suffering from acute depression, and had no physical or terminal illnesses, according to the Observer. Assisted suicide is illegal in Ireland, and the men could be sentenced to up to 14 years in prison if convicted.

Exoo and McGurrin arrived in Ireland January 22 and spent the next two days with Toole touring the countryside, the Observer reported. On January 24, they gathered in a rented house in Dublin for Toole's death.

The materials for the suicide consisted of a plastic bag and enough helium to kill 20 people, according to the Observer. Toole obtained the "Exit Bag," a euthanasia device available in Canada and Australia, by ordering it from a Canadian woman over the Internet. Exoo brought the helium with him to Ireland, the Observer reported.

According to an interview with Exoo in the Observer, Toole took some pills and then asked for a cigarette. "The last thing she did before she pulled down the bag was take one last toke on the cigarette," Exoo told the newspaper. "I said, 'OK, Rosemary, time to put the cigarette down if you don't mind.'"

Toole then tightened the bag around her head and inhaled helium until she died. Exoo said they left the house a half an hour after Toole stopped breathing. The police found her body in the house after receiving a call from Toole's 91-year-old father, who found a suicide note at the family home, the Observer reported.

Owen Toole had previous knowledge of his daughter's suicide plan and approved, Exoo told the newspaper. "We had gotten permission from her father," he said. "We asked him, 'Do you give your blessing to this?' He said, 'Yes, I do.' The suicide note was part of her plan."

Although Exoo claimed Rosemary Toole told him "she had a build-up of something or other in her brain," police officials and Toole's family insist she was mentally ill with depression, according to the Observer.

The Irish police and director of public prosecutions are currently preparing the case against Exoo and McGurrin and hope to begin formal proceedings soon. "We took a very serious view of the matter at the time and we still do," a senior member of the police investigation team told the Sunday Telegraph. "As far as we're concerned, these men were accessories to murder."

Delaware Informed Consent Law to Be Enforced

Delaware's attorney general announced that the state will begin to enforce a 1979 law requiring women seeking abortions to be informed about the procedure and then wait for 24 hours, the Wilmington News Journal reported.

"We are pleased that Delaware is finally willing to enforce its 24-year-old law protecting a woman's right to receive minimal information before deciding whether to undergoing an abortion," Mary Spaulding Balch, NRLC director of state legislation, told NRL News.

Attorney General Jane Brady asked attorneys in her office to review the law based on recent Supreme Court decisions upholding such informed consent laws in other states. Previous attorneys general had concluded that the law violated the Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision, according to the News Journal.

About seven months ago, Brady sent a recommendation to the state's Division of Professional Regulation that the law should go into effect. Under its provisions, doctors must explain the abortion procedure, risks, and alternatives, and the woman must give written consent. She can then receive an abortion after waiting 24 hours to consider her decision. The law is exempted in emergencies when the mother's life is endangered, the News Journal reported.

Valerie Watson, director of the Division of Professional Regulation, told the newspaper that notification of the informed consent requirements would be included in the annual license renewal materials sent to all doctors beginning in early February.

Planned Parenthood of Delaware responded by filing a lawsuit January 30 to try to stop the law's enforcement. The lawsuit claims that the law does not provide strong enough exceptions so an abortion could be obtained quickly in an emergency, the News Journal reported.

A spokeswoman for Planned Parenthood of Delaware said that it has begun complying with the regulations while the lawsuit is being litigated.