Churchmen urge pro-life stance for Down’s Syndrome babies
CHURCH LEADERS are to consider a campaign aimed at reducing the number of abortions carried out on pregnant women carrying children with Down’s syndrome.
The Church of England (CoE) Synod will next month be presented with a motion that calls for expectant mothers to be given “comprehensive, unbiased information” about their options.
It has been sparked by a planned NHS rollout of non-invasive prenatal testing (NIPT) for high-risk women, which would allow Down’s to be indicated by a simple blood test.
A report prepared for the Synod in London says huge advances in the “lived experience” of people with Down’s have been made in the last 30 years. But the tests mean “the place within society of people with Down’s syndrome and even their possible future existence are now under question”. The Rev Dr Brendan McCarthy, inset, the CoE’s national adviser on medical ethics, told a press conference in London: “In valuing people with Down’s syndrome, it is difficult to say that we value you and we will continue to value you if people like you disappear completely. “While it obviously is the woman’s choice what to do with her pregnancy, our hope is that with full information, with up-to-date information, and with information provided in the way we have
been mentioning, significant numbers of women will choose to continue with their pregnancy.”
A report, Valuing People with
Down’s Syndrome, will be presented at the Synod, which is meeting from February 8 to February 10. Written by Mark Sheard, chairman of the Mission and Public Affairs Council, it notes life expectancy for those with Down’s Syndrome has risen from 25 in 1970 to 60 today.
It adds: “In countries such as Iceland and Denmark, which have almost universal screening and close to 100 per cent termination rates, there is a real possibility that people with Down’s Syndrome will effectively disappear from their populations.”
Dr McCarthy said 482 pregnancies with a Down’s diagnosis were terminated in 2010, rising to 706 in 2016, despite a 6,000 fall in overall termination numbers in the same period.