PRO-LIFE NEWS IN BRIEF

By Liz Townsend

Baby Survives Illegal Late-Term Abortion

A baby who survived an attempted abortion in Valdosta, Georgia, is recovering in a Florida hospital's critical care unit. Police allege that an abortionist gave the baby's mother "several pills" to try to abort her 30-week-old unborn baby and then left the mother to give birth alone, according to the Valdosta Daily Times.

The alleged abortionist, Charles Rossmann, closed his clinic and fled the area after the incident, the Daily Times reported. Police have issued an arrest warrant for Rossmann, charging him with criminal abortion. In Georgia, third-trimester abortions are allowed only if the mother experiences "health risks," and they must be performed in a hospital or a facility specifically authorized for late abortions, according to the Associated Press (AP).

The Georgia Medical Board suspended Rossmann's medical license May 15, asserting that his "continued practice as a physician poses a threat to the public health, safety and welfare and imperatively require emergency action," the Daily Times reported.

The unidentified woman called 911 from Rossmann's office May 9. She had just delivered a baby boy and was alone in the building. The doors had been locked from the outside, and the emergency personnel had to break them down, according to the Daily Times. According to police, the mother told them she paid Rossmann in cash for the abortion. After he started an unspecified procedure that police presume was meant to induce labor, Rossmann gave the woman contact information and then left, the AP reported.

The baby boy is now being treated at Shands Hospital in Gainesville, Florida. His mother was treated and released from South Georgia Medical Center, according to the Daily Times.

Misinterpreted Genetic Test May Lead to Abortions

A genetic test for cystic fibrosis is often misinterpreted or used incorrectly, which may lead to risky amniocentesis procedures or abortions, according to New Scientist.

Cystic fibrosis (CF), a disease affecting the mucus glands that causes serious digestive and breathing problems, is diagnosed when two gene mutations are present in chromosome 7. The genetic screening was meant to be used only after a rare mutation called R117H was found in the mother and father's DNA, tested by taking blood or saliva samples. If both parents have R117H along with a more common mutation known as 5T, the child has a one in four chance of having cystic fibrosis, New Scientist reported. Over 5% of the population has the 5T mutation, but unless R117H is present it does not indicate CF.

If the parents test positive for both mutations, the unborn child would be tested by amniocentesis, which causes miscarriage in 1 in 200 cases, according to New Scientist.

However, some screeners are not waiting to confirm the presence of R117H before they test for 5T. Patients who discover they have the 5T mutation alone have requested further testing or even abortions, New Scientist reported, in the mistaken belief that the child has CF.

American College of Medical Genetics Executive Director Michael Watson confirmed this at a March medical symposium, announcing that his group has "anecdotal" evidence that some couples have aborted their babies after screening results were misinterpreted, according to the Baltimore Sun.

"This is heartbreaking. I'm deeply saddened," Kathy Hudson, director of the Genetics and Public Policy Center at Johns Hopkins University, told the Los Angeles Times. "This is not what was intended when we started this screening. You should get accurate information from the test, not information that is worrisome and anxiety-producing but doesn't have a whole lot to do with cystic fibrosis."

The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists recommended in 2001 that testing for CF should become a routine part of prenatal care. Now, between 200,000 and 400,000 genetic tests for CF are being conducted annually, according to the Times.

"Cystic fibrosis is the first genetic test to be routinely offered to prospective parents in the U.S., and the cracks in the system are already plain," Hudson told Agence France-Presse. "Reflect on what is likely to happen when the many other genetic tests in the pipeline come through."

In order to combat such deadly mistakes, some experts are calling for more regulation of the genetic screening industry. "It is startling that here is more regulation for the coloring in M&Ms than there is for genetic tests, which can provide the information on which profound health decisions are made," Hudson told the Times.

Australian Court Authorizes Feeding Tube Withdrawal

An Australian woman disabled by dementia faces death by starvation and dehydration after the Victoria Supreme Court ruled May 29 that her guardian may order her feeding tube removed.

Known only as BWV, the 68-year-old woman has received a nutritional supplement through a feeding tube since 1995, according to The Age. She now lives in a nursing home in Victoria, unable to speak or interact with her environment.

BWV's husband and her court-appointed guardian both asked the court to allow them to remove her feeding tube. "At a certain point the progression of illness, pro-longation of life becomes ambiguous, then meaningless and transforms into the deferral of death," guardian Julian Gardner told the news agency AAP.

Right to Life Australia president Margaret Tighe told AAP.that, although she sympathizes with the family, it is "not an act of love to kill somebody by dehydration and starvation."

Victorian law allows guardians to withdraw medical treatment from an incompetent patient unless it is meant to provide "palliative care," defined as "the provision of reasonable medical procedures for the relief of pain, suffering and discomfort or the reasonable provision of food and water," according to The Age.

After a three-day hearing, the court ruled that feeding through a tube does not constitute "palliative care." Rather, Justice Stewart Morris wrote that "it was not the intent of the parliament when it framed the Medical Treatment Act in 1988 that dying people would be forced to consume food and water," The Age reported. He added that "parliament also did not intend palliative care to include artificial feeding and hydration but only ordinary provision of food and water."

During the hearing, the court heard from organizations opposed to the feeding tube withdrawal. The Catholic Church, Catholic Health Australia, and Right to Life Australia argued that classifying the delivery of food and water as a medical treatment that could be removed will lead to death by starvation, not death from the disease itself.

According to The Age, Joseph Santamaria, QC, representing the Catholic Archbishop of Melbourne, Denis Hart, and Catholic Health Australia, told the court that BWV "would die from renal failure and 'under-nutrition' without the food and water equivalent."

Pro-life groups insisted that this case will have a great impact on other disabled people in Australia. "This is of paramount importance with national implications and that is why we want to be heard on this matter," Tighe told The Age.

After the decision was announced, Gardner made it clear that the feeding tube will be removed in the near future. "Her wish not to have medical intervention in the form of artificial nutrition and hydration coincides with what I consider to be her best interests," Gardner told the Herald Sun.

"And therefore in due course those wishes will be respected."