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Salient. Victoria University Student Newspaper. Volume 39, Number 18, July 26, 1976.
[Introduction]
I am a registered medical practitioner, I hold the appointment of Professor in Perinatal Psysiology in the Postgraduate School of Obstetrics and (gynaecology, University of Auckland, and I am a member of the consultant staff of National Women's Hospital, Auckland. My qualifications, other appointments, and publications, are set forth in my curriculum vitae and in my list of publications.
For the past nineteen years my main field of research and clinical practice has been the care of unborn children. Initially this work established accurate diagnostic tests by which the condition of the unborn Rh baby could be assessed. In 1963 I developed a technique for the transfusion of blood to the baby in utero. Phis work demonstrated conclusively that the unborn child, like any other person, could be ill, and could have his disease diagnosed, his condition assessed, and his malady successfully treated The diagnosis and therapy of each of these babies before birth is as precise and specific as the continuing care and attention they receive after birth.
Although this early work was concerned primarily with the problems of the Rh baby before birth, the experience gained, and the techniques developed, are now being exploited for the diagnosis and management of an ever-widening range of disorders in unborn children. This situation highlights the fact that, in modern antenatal care, we are concerned with the welfare of two patients: the mother and the child.
In a number of genetic and biochemical problems, definite diagnosis can be established as early as the 14th week, and, in the Rh baby, therapy has been undertaken as early as the 18th week of intrauterine life. With advances in technology these limits are being moved back earlier in pregnancy. The division of intrauterine life into segments (zygote, embryo, fetus, etc. is a semantic phenomenon, and is in no way supported by biological or medical fact. We are caring for the same child throughout pregnancy, before as well as after birth.
Because of the facts uncovered by my research, as a doctor I have no alternative but to regard the unborn child as my patient, and to protect and respect his life as I would the life of any other patient. In my opinion, therefore, abortion is abhorrent, and represents a policy which would be regarded as immoral and criminal with a patient in any other age group. From clinical experience I am convinced that unborn children are individuals and human beings, who should have legal protection, and who are capable of receiving and responding to medical care.
For that reason I was disturbed by developments oversea in favour of liberal abortion policies. The argument, as I understood them, seemed to concentrate on the wishes of the mother rather than an accurate and factual evaluation of what is involved in an abortion. In particular it seemed to me that the facts relating to the unborn child were being distorted (whether deliberately or through ignorance I did not know so as to give the public the impression that the fetus, particularly in the first 12 weeks, could hardly be treated as a "child". It appeared to me that the New Zealand public could be vulnerable to propaganda of this kind, and as a counter-measure I was glad to be able to assist with the formation of the Society for the Protection of the Unborn Child.
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As any high school biology text-book will tell us, life begins at conception and ends at death. In between, lite does not develop it is simply there.
What does develop is the morphological structure, the earthly home of life, the physiological performance, of that structure, behavioural traits and personality. And, as we increasingly expand into a community of like individuals, we can speak of development of social responsibilities, of ethical awareness and legal status.
Unfortunately, this expansion of concept is accompanied by a deterioration in fact and specificty. Any modern textbook of embryology will accurately recount the earliest stages of morphogenesis of the human body. A little behind but catching up are accounts of the physiological performance and behaviour of the embryo and fetus.
In other words, when dealing with observation and sensory data there is good agreement. But, as we expand into social, speculation and value judgments successively replace fact and understanding; dispute and disagreement replace unanimity.
Instead of steady advances in knowledge and practice, we find the earliest days of human life being tossed about in the market-place, the Courts and the hustings, the victim of social policies hair-raisingly erractic and increasingly alarming.
Our generation is the first ever to have a reasonably complete picture of the development of the human from conception. In the 1930s the liberation of a human egg from the ovary was first observed. In 1944, through a microscope, was seen as the union of the human sperm and the ovum. In the 1950s the events of the first six days [unclear: first steps in a] journey.
In the 1960s three further advances occurred. First as I have said, the direct diagnosis and treatment in a baby before birth became a reality. Secondly, the physical environment and physiological behaviour of the fetus became accessible to study. Thirdly the genetic code was cracked, the alphabet established in which is spelled out the instructions which guarantee that every human is unique and different from every human than ever was or ever will be.
These 40 years of discovery put an end to centuries of guesswork and controversy - of ideas of generation, animation, ensoulment, en capsulation. For a generation which reputedly prefers scientific fact to barren philosophy, we might have thought that this new information would engender a new respect for the welfare and appreciation of the importance of intrauterine life.
Instead, around the world we find a systematic campaign clamouring for the destruction of the embryo and fetus as a cure-all for every social and personal problem. 1 for one find it a bitter irony that just when the embryo and fetus finally arrives on the medical scene there should be such sustained pressure to make him - or her - a social nonentity.
In this Orwellian situation, where so much semantic effort and logical gymnastics are expended in making a developing human into an "un-person", modern anatomical, genetic, immunological, endocrinological and physiological facts are a persistent.
How much easier to echo that simple statment, "But there's nothing there yet", without pausing to reflect that if there is nothing there, then why the unholy rush to remove it? Nevertheless, not everyone is away with the fairies, and for the benefit of those still in touch with reality we can briefly review some aspects of intrauterine life.