Sir, – May I thank you for publishing the truth about abortion (Ruth Cullen, Opinion, March 5th Hugh J Masterson, March 7th)? For far too long we have been bombarded on this issue by its for-profit industry. How about an investigation of its funding which would make most interesting reading?
May I take issue with Denise Ryan’s claim (March 7th) that abortion is a “standard medical practice”? How true is that? How can the deliberate killing of the baby – which is what abortion is – be a “standard medical practice”?
From my experience and that of the vast number of mothers, gynaecologists/obstetricians are obliged to treat both patients: mother and baby. By what muddled rationale can it be deduced that it is acceptable to deliberately kill one?
Ireland, according to the World Health Organisation, is one of the safest countries in the world in which to have a baby, due in no small measure to the fact that every effort is made to treat both patients.
The most basic human right is the right to life. All other rights emanate from it. Hopefully, we will now have a debate based on fact and truth and not controlled by those with a vested interest in having abortion legalised in Ireland. – Yours, etc,
Sir, – I have to take issue with Ruth Cullen’s claims about the apparent effects of abortion on mental heath (Opinion, March 5th). In 2011 the National Collaborating Centre for Mental Health (NCCMH) published a systematic review of English language studies between 1990 and 2011 on mental health outcomes for women who had had an abortion. The results indicated that, contrary to Ms Cullen’s claims, it is an unwanted pregnancy rather than abortion that was associated with mental health problems.
The most significant predictor for mental health problems after having an abortion was found to be a prior history of same.
Indeed, the factors that were associated with higher mental health problems post-abortion pertained to things such as pressure from a partner to have an abortion and negative societal attitudes to abortion rather than the act of the abortion itself.
This conclusion has also been supported by the American Psychological Association, which in 2008 stated that, based on current research, women who had an abortion were not at a higher risk of subsequent psychological problems than women who carried the pregnancy to term. It has often been found that studies purporting to support Ms Cullen’s claim fail to control for whether the woman has had mental health problems prior to her abortion.
Ms Cullen, by oddly omitting the current consensus among the major expert organisations in the fields of psychology and psychiatry on this issue, does the opposite of what she claims to want in discussions regarding abortion – clear factual information based on science, not skewed ideologically biased interpretations of the information available to us.
The abortion debate in Ireland for too long has been ruled by an unchallenged absence of facts and Ms Cullen’s article only serves to offer misinformation routinely peddled as “fact”. – Yours, etc,