JOE McENRI,
Sir, - Senator Mary Henry (January 7th) refers to near-miss maternal mortality cases in the Coombe Women's Hospital. She cites a study which looked at near-miss maternal mortality from January 1st, 1999 to October 30th, 2001 and quotes 50 cases in over 21,000 births.
The figures and the inference by Senator Henry are misleading and I would like to clarify these. There were in fact 35 cases of near-miss maternal mortality, of which 29 were related to haemorrhage. The average gestational age of these pregnancies was 37 weeks. There were no cases of significant haemorrhage in early pregnancy.
I do not believe that these cases are relevant to the abortion referendum, as none of them would have been prevented by a termination of pregnancy. The issues raised by these cases of near-miss maternal mortality are issues of obstetric care in pregnancies with a viable foetus and as such these women could be treated in any obstetric unit in Ireland regardless of the outcome of the proposed referendum.
While I believe that an informed debate is important, I think it is misleading to discuss cases of near-miss maternal mortality in the context of a referendum on abortion. - Yours, etc.,
Dr SEAN DALY,
Master,
Coombe Women's Hospital,
Dublin 8.
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Sir, - Your Editorial of January 26th calls on the Government to abandon the abortion poll as your MRBI poll shows divisions in the electorate on holding it and on support for the Government proposal. Following the same logic, and given the opinion poll findings published by you earlier in the week, shouldn't you now be calling on the Government to abandon plans to hold a general election? - Yours, etc.,
JOE McENRI,
Lucan,
Co Dublin.