Sir, – Having been a social worker in London during the 1980s, and seeing many young Irish women having to leave home to have their babies adopted, I watch with both sadness and interest the current debate on the abortion legislation in Ireland.
Surely, in this day and age the case for women’s health outweighs the religious issues being currently made to hold back progress. The women I saw were put in an invidious situation by the religious mores of the time. Please don’t do this again. – Yours, etc,
JENNY DUNLOP,
Whaley Lane,
Whaley Bridge,
Derbyshire, England.
Sir, – I refer to the article by Dr David Grimes (Opinion, June 25th) in which he refers to the pro-life statement last September that “abortion is never necessary to save the life of a mother”.
Dr Grimes seems not to have read or heard any further qualification of this statement. The situation in Ireland to date is that in the treatment of pregnant women with a medically life-threatening condition such as ectopic pregnancy or pre-eclampsia the mother is given whatever medical procedure is necessary to save her life. This intervention may endanger the life of the foetus, but every effort is made to save that life, sadly not always successfully, and the mother has to accept that “I lost the baby”.
It is in this attitude of care for the foetus/unborn child that such medical intervention differs from abortion, the direct object of which is the death of the unborn. There is a clear difference between the two approaches. – Yours, etc,
MAIRE C Ní BHEIRN,
Narin Road,
Ardara, Co Donegal.