Bill upsets doctors

Press, 21 August 1976, Page 3

Bill upsets doctors

i [’A Hamilton , Some doctors threaten |to defy the provisions of (the Health Amendment I Bill if it is enacted and to continue to perform I abortions. i The chairman of the New Zealand Medical Association (Dr William Treadwell) said yesterday that doctors wqre in a “very angry mood” as a result of the introduction of the bill in Parliament by the Minister of Health (Mr Gill). He had heard reports that some doctors were talking about continuing to perform iabortions. “These doctors iwere talking in anger — nolone knows yet how the bill (will end up?’ Dr Treadwell said. The director of the Auckland Medical Aid Trust (Mr R. Clough) said he had been telephoned by a doctor who had said he was prepared to flout any anti-abortion legislation. The doctor was a general practitioner who did not work at-the trust’s abortion clinic.

’‘The feeling among doctors over this is hot,” Mr Clough said. “The decision to introduce the bill is a big slap in the face for doctors. The Government is saying that G.P.s cannot be trusted and that decision (about abortions) must be made by public-hospital committees.” Doctors were “stunned” that the bill would close the trust clinic, he said. The trust had always obeyed the law to the letter, and would continue to do so. Any doctors who wanted to continue the trust’s role would do so in their own surgeries. The Health Amendment Bill will impose new restrictions on women's access to abortions. The draft introduced will force women seeking legal abortion to go before a committee of at least two doctors appointed by a hospital board. If a committee is satisfied that a woman’s medical condition justifies an abortion, it will issue a certificate allowing the operation to be performed in either a public 'hospital or a licensed private hospital, provided the I woman has received adequate counselling from a hospital board-appointed committee.

“The bill will bring back the horror conditions that existed before the trust began,” Mr Clough said. Women will not tolerate the inhumanity and humilitation of having to be interrogated by a hospital committee — and as they will face delays of up to a month or more, the abortion may not be able to be carried out in sofetyl “Once again, it will be a matter of women having to] play Russian roulette for an I abortion because every hos-l pital committee will give varying rulings, as they used to before,” Mr Clough said.

It was obvious that the public hospitals would not be able to cope with the extra workload, and had no intention of even trying. ■“Even if they wanted to try, they could not — they do not have the facilities, the manpower, or the money,” Mr Clough said. Dr Treadwell said that the Medical Association would

"take the offensive” against the bill. It would ask its divisions throughout New Zealand to convene meetings urgently, and invite their local members of Parliament to attend a debate on the issue. “Doctors are in a very angry mood — we are a disappointed profession,” Dr Treadwell said. “It is incredible.that the legislation has been introduced against the wishes of the majority of doctors.”