Abortion 'a matter of social convenience’

Press, 7 August 1976, Page 20

Abortion 'a matter of social convenience’

PA Rotorua Abortion in New Zealand was obviously a matter of social convenience, and not to; save the life of the mother said Miss Patricia Bartlett, of the Society for the Promotion of Communitv Standards, in an address prepared for delivery to the Rotorua Toastmistress Club The Remuera abortion clinic would have had its doors closed on September 1 last year if Dr G. H. Wall’s original bill, which asked that abortions be performed onlv in public hospitals, had not been meddled with at the in-, ustence of certain members of Parliament, Miss Bartlett said. "Since Parliament ruined Dr Wall's bill, it is up to! Parliament to give urgent' priority to legislate to remedy its grave error of legalising ebortion on demand in private hospitals,” she said. Referring to the Aotea Abortion Hospital as the "Aotea Abortorium, because' Its sole function is to destroy life,” Miss Bartlett said that since September, 1975, the Government had handed out from the taxpayers’ money 112 a day subsidy for every' sbortion ’ performed at the hospital. The hospital had 18 beds and so it was possible to tarry out 90 abortions a week, on the premises. “This num-1 her multiplies to 360 a month, ind to 4680 children a year,” the said. "An abortion at Aotea Hospital costs sloo,j which means that the annual

lucrative abortion income could be almost SIM- a year. "Before the Royal Commission, the hospital s accountant disclosed that one year’s profit was $137,000. Yet Dr Rex Hunton, of the Aotea Hospital Trust adamantly maintains that it is a non-profit organisation,” Miss Bartlett said. Public hospitals throughout New Zealand in the last few years had increased their abortions by almost 300 per cent because of the uncertainty of the interpretation of the law. “The Remuera Abortion Clinic in its first 16 months of operation aborted about 2300 lives,” Miss Bartlett said. “Since it became the private Aotea Hospital last year, as a result of the unfortunate amendments to the wording of the Hospitals Amendment Bill, a further 3800 innocent lives have been destroyed in this hospital.” It was imperative the law state clearly that an unborn child must never be destroyed, said Miss Bartlett, the one and only exception being when the mother’s life was in physical danger. “The present law has loopholes whereby unscrupulous doctors are recommending abortions for social and economic reasons,” she said. “A woman with genuine psychiatric illness is not cured by an abortion, for her condition still continues after her child is destroyed.” There were large waiting!

lists of adoptive parents all ‘over New Zealand. If the Aotea Hospital was running jan adoptive agency, it would ithen be a charitable trust worthy of the Government I subsidies it was receiving. "It appears that medical iprogress and the Hippocratic oath to save life are of little interest to certain members of the medical profession,” Miss Bartlett said. If human life was no longer to be of paramount importance. it was hypocritical to work for a better quality of family life by way of a family affairs committee and an Environment Commission. “Each week’s delav means that another 80 to 100 little New Zealanders are put into the Aotea incinerator.” Miss Bartlett said.