Australian Senate rejects measure requiring appropriate care for abortion survivors

A motion recognizing that preborn children who survive abortion should be provided medical care instead of being routinely left to die was defeated in Australia.

Queensland midwife Louise Adsett testified before Parliament this month, saying that she regularly witnesses babies born alive and left to die. “These babies were alive from anywhere from two to 20 minutes, to three to five hours,” Adsett said, growing emotional as she spoke. “Sometimes babies born alive after an abortion are put into witches’ hats and are covered, just taken out of the room, and die while in that witch’s hat. ”

Dr Joanna Howe

@ProfJoannaHowe

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BREAKING: Today midwife Lou Adsett broke down as she shared harrowing stories of babies born alive and left to die for up to five hours in her hospital. She gave oral evidence that babies are discarded in the dirty pan room, placed on witches hats and left to die. Between 2010 Show more

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12:38 PM · Aug 19, 2024

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Adsett spoke about a baby who survived an abortion attempt at 21 weeks, and was moving and breathing. She said the baby was “over 400 grams,” and so was born at a good weight. “The parents of this baby did not desire to see or hold this baby,” she said. “Midwives and doctors were left holding this little life while it continued to – while they continued to provide care for other women who were birthing and welcoming their babies into the world. This baby boy fought for his life for five hours before taking his final breath.”

A bill was introduced in response to this parliamentary inquiry by Robbie Katter, of Katter’s Australian Party, which would have no effect on the legal status of abortion, but merely require that babies born alive after an attempted abortion to be given the same care as anyone else. If a baby was too young to survive after an abortion attempt, he or she would be required to receive palliative care.

University of Adelaide law professor Joanna Howe, who is pro-life and has faced discrimination for her pro-life activism, told The Australian there have been 328 babies born alive and left to die in Queensland between 2010 and 2020. She said the bill would make Queensland align with “recent best-practice reform in South Australia and New South Wales, which provides for equal treatment to all children born alive in those jurisdictions irrespective of the circumstances of their birth.” Senator Ralph Babet then called for a vote in federal Parliament, requiring these protections for all newborns.

Unfortunately, Howe reported that the measure failed, with 31 senators voting against the measure and just 18 voting in favor, which Howe described as “heartless, cruel, and barbaric.” In an appearance on the Rita Panahi Show, Howe said the vote “tells you something about the quality of people in our Senate.”

Howe argued that it was a simple motion which should not have been controversial for anyone. “It’s just disturbing. I actually can’t understand how anybody, how any Australian, can vote against a motion calling for equal treatment for those children, especially after the harrowing, groundbreaking, courageous testimony of Louise Adsett the day before, that blew the lid on this whole thing,” she said, adding, “This is a tragedy occurring under our noses in our hospitals, every single week in this country.”

This sort of “heartlessness” isn’t limited to Australia. U.S. legislators have been unable to fully pass a similar Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act for years.

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