Category: Born Alive after an Abortion

A student midwife identified as MK tells the following story:

It happened in 2015, in the hospital delivery room. One patient was present, she was 22 weeks +3 days amenorrheic [without a period] and was there for a late miscarriage. The child was born alive, and to prevent it from crying, the doctor quickly covered his face. He was then taken into a side room (baby resuscitation room) where I could join him. I was able to find that there was no apparent defect, he struggled to breathe and he had some slight gestures.

He was fully formed, had eyelashes, hair, nails … (He had even slightly long nails!) He weighed 565g and was about 27cm. The doctor came in and asked me if he was still breathing, or else we would make an injection for that “to be resolved.”

Five minutes later he came back and grabbed a syringe KCl (lethal injection for this premature baby). Somewhat bewildered, I asked him if we cannot do something “more natural”, but he answers my question by sweeping [sic] he prefers not to let the child suffer. He then pierced the baby in the heart, and injected the product. The child, during the injection, moved all its members. I do not know what that meant, but perhaps he suffered.

The little boy lived just a quarter of an hour. The medical team told the parents of the child that he was stillborn. This is why we did not want him to cry at birth: it would be too traumatic for them.

What shocked me personally, is the cold-blooded doctor (head of department) that had injected the child in the heart. The fact that the child was alive was a problem that needed to be addressed: it has never been contemplated to tell the parents what really happened.

Grégor Puppinck PhD (Dir.), Claire de La Hougue PhD, Andreea Popescu, Christophe Foltzenlogel.  “Late Term Abortion & Neonatal Infanticide in Europe: Petition for the Rights of Newborns Surviving Their Abortion” European Centre for Law and Justice

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From a European report on babies born alive after abortions.

Midwife M.J. tells her story. She and a male nursing student were handed white sheets rolled like a ball and told to check for instruments. They discovered, however, that inside was a baby still breathing.

We opened the sheet, removed all the compresses and discovered a lot of clotted blood: we discovered within the blood, a mass, that was a fetus, and he was still breathing. We were shocked.

It all felt so frigid! The nursing student and I talked and agreed to say that he was alive and that we had to do something immediately. So, we wiped and washed the little body and wrapped him in a “cloth diaper.”

We delicately placed him on the tray and covered him. I do not know what his gestational age was, but he was a boy and his members were well formed. Another nurse arrived, and she saw us near the fetus. She said we did well and we took this opportunity to question her:

“What happened to the mother? “She did what she had to do to abort and lost a lot of blood by expelling the fetus. She is now in the operating room and it is unclear if she will make it!” My colleague and I stayed near the fetus who was breathing heavily with increasing spaces between each breathe. It felt like time had stopped. We were there to look at him, this little living being, talking to him and stroking his little body through the drape for 45 minutes at least. … He finally stopped breathing and we left him on his tray.

Grégor Puppinck PhD (Dir.), Claire de La Hougue PhD, Andreea Popescu, Christophe Foltzenlogel.  “Late Term Abortion & Neonatal Infanticide in Europe: Petition for the Rights of Newborns Surviving Their Abortion” European Centre for Law and Justice

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In a report on live births after abortion by the Eurpean Centre for Law and Justice, one doctor says:

At the guard in the delivery room, a woman was in labor as part of an abortion on medical grounds at 5 months pregnant. The birth was imminent, and the gynecology interns were prepared. The senior gynecologist of the guard who is about to return to her bed, approaches the interns and said in a low voice, but loud enough for me to hear: “If the child is breathing on arrival, you press hard here on the trachea [airway] until it completely stops breathing,” and turning to me: “And you, you did not hear anything.

Grégor Puppinck PhD (Dir.), Claire de La Hougue PhD, Andreea Popescu, Christophe Foltzenlogel. “Late Term Abortion & Neonatal Infanticide in Europe: Petition for the Rights of Newborns Surviving Their Abortion” European Centre for Law and Justice

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A report from the European Centre for Law and Justice has this testimony from L.M., a former anesthetic nurse, about a baby born alive after an abortion. The mother had an abortion because she had AIDS:

Gynecologists convinced [the mother] to abort but the baby was born alive. Midwives simply put it in an empty box, naked in a stainless steel tub, cold, without any care. His mother was conscious during labor and delivery of the baby; she was crying and wanted to see her little one but the doctors decided that this child should die. They did not give the child to the mother to spare her. This baby was viable, he was breathing on his own and cried vigorously. I honestly think it was just left to die of cold … it was horrible…! We were harnessed in our gloves, overshirts, headwear, masks, “overshoes” because we were afraid of getting AIDS, and the baby, naked, abandoned by all, and so vulnerable. He took a long time to stop whining.

I almost picked him up to comfort, warm, and save him, but I did not do anything… They all looked so sure that this was the solution. The whole team was nevertheless extremely uncomfortable. The Obstetrician was the decision maker, seeing that he had medically agreed to perform an abortion, and united the midwives by force. I had a little girl of four months at home and I was afraid for her. Why do they fight to save some premature babies while others are given death without humanity? We do not want to actively kill them but passively do! I stopped anesthesia because I could not stand being obliged to put women to sleep for an abortion on demand or medical abortion.”

Even in 1987, there were steps doctors could take to prevent the baby from contracting AIDS if he was allowed to be born.

Grégor Puppinck PhD (Dir.), Claire de La Hougue PhD, Andreea Popescu, Christophe Foltzenlogel“Late Term Abortion & Neonatal Infanticide in Europe: Petition for the Rights of Newborns Surviving Their Abortion” European Centre for Law and Justice, 2015

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A midwife gives the following testimony:

A midwife for almost 9 years, I can testify that babies born from late abortions (case of abortion on medical grounds) without feticide, usually between 20 and 24 weeks gestation, may be born alive. The medical team is then often uncomfortable and either puts the baby in a tray in a separate room until he stops showing signs of life, or asks a gynecologist, anesthetist or pediatrician for a morphine injection in the cord that some accept … or not. For my part, I have already proposed to concerned couples that if the baby was alive at birth, to lay him on the woman’s stomach for him to die with dignity. Two couples agreed.

I recently decided not to participate in abortions on demand or abortions on medical grounds and to apply my conscience clause, which I can do because I am incumbent. I will probably leave the relevant services, including the delivery room. Those contractual employees who would apply their conscience clause are threatened with not having their contracts renewed.

In my experience, I’ve come to the conclusion that in order to protect the right to abortion, an embryo or fetus is considered to be a person by medical practitioners under two conditions:

1. The child must be wanted by the parents and

2. The child must be “normal” and not “disabled” (with all the risks that such a subjective term permits).

As soon as the fetus fails to meet these conditions, it is just considered to be waste… It’s terrible to say, but that is the truth.

Grégor Puppinck PhD (Dir.), Claire de La Hougue PhD, Andreea Popescu, Christophe Foltzenlogel   “Late Term Abortion & Neonatal Infanticide in Europe: Petition for the Rights of Newborns Surviving Their Abortion” ECLJ (European Centre for Law and Justice) June 2015

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A report by the European Centre for Law and Justice revealed the following incident:

It was in 1973, I was beginning my second year at the nursing school and it was my first day of my internship in the maternity department. At 4:30 p.m. a nurse hastily came in the treatment room with a white sheets rolled like a ball, holding it to us and said “check that there are no instruments in it, take the compresses and put the drape in the laundry.” I was with a classmate I did not know because he was not from my school. He seemed older than me. Delicately we opened the sheet, removed all the compresses and discovered a lot of clotted blood: we discovered within the blood, a mass, that was a fetus, and he was still breathing.

We were shocked. Another nurse arrived at that moment and we told her that the fetus was breathing. As a response she said: “Well, put it in a basin, and wait!” It all felt so frigid! The nursing student and I talked and agreed to say that he was alive and that we had to do something immediately. So, we wiped and washed the little body and wrapped him in a “cloth diaper.” We delicately placed him on the tray and covered him. I do not know what his gestational age was, but he was a boy and his members were well formed.

Another nurse arrived, and she saw us near the fetus. She said we did well and we took this opportunity to question her: – “What happened to the mother? – She did what she had to do to abort and lost a lot of blood by expelling the fetus. She is now in the operating room and it is unclear if she will make it!” My colleague and I stayed near the fetus who was breathing heavily with increasing spaces between each breathe. It felt like time had stopped. We were there to look at him, this little living being, talking to him and stroking his little body through the drape for 45 minutes at least. […]

He finally stopped breathing and we left him on his tray. It was the end of the first day of the internship. I must say that the 15 days of internship were difficult. The nurses were running around like “a chicken with its head cut off,” and it was not possible to talk about this event with them.

Grégor Puppinck PhD (Dir.), Claire de La Hougue PhD, Andreea Popescu, Christophe Foltzenlogel  “Late Term Abortion & Neonatal Infanticide in Europe” Petition for the Rights of Newborns Surviving Their Abortion ECLJ (European Centre for Law and Justice) June 2015

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From an abortionist:

“It is not too unusual that a pregnancy turns out to be 4 weeks more advanced than would be determined by the given dates. A number of 28 weeks gestations have been salted out [aborted by a saline injection], resulting in the birth of living children. The emotional distress engendered is horrendous.”

A Altchek “Abortion Alert” Ob & Gyn 42(3): 452-454, Sept 1973

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“In 1982, a story broken in the Torrance (California) Daily Breeze that San Vincente Hospital was being investigated for allegedly allowing a live fetus from a late-term abortion to be immersed in a jar of formaldehyde. A hospital technician stated in an affidavit filed by the Los Angeles County Department of Health Services, that she saw the fetus move after it was extracted from the mother and put on a table. Shocked, she dropped the fetus when she tried to place it in a specimen jar containing formaldehyde.

Another technician, according to the affidavit signed by a hospital employee upset over the incident, grabbed the moving, live fetus, and put it in the jar. Health department records state that the 1^st technician “could not believe the doctor would not attempt to resuscitate the fetus.” He didn’t. The male fetus was estimated to be from 6 to 7 months developed. The fetus died.”

Nick Thimmesch “When Abortion Fails, the Unborn’s Uncertain Destiny” Toronto, Ontario: Life Cycle Books

This should read “the baby died.” A child living independently from the mother is no longer a fetus, but a baby.

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In one article on performing late term abortions:

“We use urea to be certain that we effect fetal death. It is unsettling to all personnel to deliver these fetuses when they are not stillborn.”

R Wachbroit and D Wasserman “Patient Autonomy and Value Neutrality Nondirective Genetic Counseling” Stanford Law & Policy Review 1995; 6 (2): 103 – 11

Quoted in Angela Lanfranchi, Ian Gentles, Elizabeth Ring – Cassidy Complications: Abortions Impact on Women (Ontario, Canada: The deVeber Institute for Bioethics and Social Research, 2013)

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