An anti-abortion group is outraged at what it calls Hamilton Family Planning’s plan to “kill on premises”.
Voice for Life protesters staged what they called a “peaceful yet powerful protest” yesterday outside Family Planning’s clinic in Anglesea St, which could become the first centre of its kind in New Zealand to offer medical abortions.
Unlike surgical abortions, medical procedures meant pregnant women would take a three-day course of Mifegyne, a drug that protest organiser Robyn Jackson said caused severe side-effects. Until now no Waikato health service provider had offered medical abortions.
However, Waikato, Thames and Tokoroa hospitals perform surgical abortions. In 2008 they carried out a total of 2150 procedures.
Voice for Life Waikato president Kathryn Marelich said if Family Planning was granted the licence it would provide what she called an unnecessary licence to kill using chemicals she believed could do more harm than good.
“We want those women to be better informed about the side-effects of taking those types of chemicals. Twelve people have died in the US from complications like excessive bleeding and infection,” Ms Marelich warned.
Right to Life wrote to all MPs outlining the major problems in the Family Planning Association’s application to the Abortion Supervisory Committee for a license to commit abortions, below is an excerpt,
Right to Life knows that the Family Planning Association is strongly pro-abortion and unsuitable to be granted a licence to terminate the lives of unborn children.
The Association is the major abortion referral agency in New Zealand and believes that abortion is needed as a back up for so called failed contraceptives.
It supports girls under the age of 16 being able to have an abortion without the knowledge or consent of parents.
It has an employment policy to employ only doctors who believe that abortion is for a woman to choose in consultation with a doctor of her choice, this is abortion on demand which is unlawful in New Zealand.
In the event of the Association being granted a licence to perform abortions, our Society would have serious concerns about the lawfulness of these abortions. You would be aware that Justice Miller in the High Court Judicial Review of the performance of the Abortion Supervisory Committee, stated in his judgment in June 2008, that abortion on demand was unlawful and that “there is reason to doubt the lawfulness of many abortions authorised by certifying consultants.”
Many doctors employed by Family Planning are certifying consultants.
The Association is an ardent advocate for the decriminalisation of abortion in New Zealand.
The Association believes that unborn children are not endowed with inalienable human rights, that the killing of an unborn child is not a crime and that abortion should be a health matter for a woman to choose.
The Association is a vocal advocate of a “woman’s right to choose to terminate the life of her child” there is no such right.
Mifegyne RU486, used in New Zealand for medical abortions is a poisonous pill, its sole purpose is to kill an innocent and defenceless unborn child in its first seven weeks of life.
Family First NZ is supporting a protest in Hamilton this afternoon against Family Planning applying to the Abortion Supervisory Committee for a license to use the abortion pill RU486 to perform abortions.
“This will mean that Family Planning will be able to talk women into having abortions, and then carry the procedure out on them,” says Bob McCoskrie, National Director of Family First NZ. “There is a huge conflict of interest here. Those offering advice shouldn’t be the ones performing the abortions.”
“There is also huge concern about the drug’s considerable harmful effects on women’s health, with a US track record that includes deaths and over a thousand reports of complications – many of them serious or life-threatening. RU-486 has produced none of the effects of normalising abortion that were predicted for it.”
Voice for Life put out a press release on 23 October expressing their opposition to Family Planning’s application for a license to commit abortions (initially) at their Hamilton branch,
“If approved, this means that women who turn to Family Planning for advice and information at a time of crisis pregnancy, are likely to be offered instead a ‘conveyor-belt’ to medical abortion and a future of unacknowledged loss and hidden trauma that often accompanies this procedure,” she says.
“There is no way around it. Abortion ends the life of a real, unique human being and has life long consequences for the mother”, she says. “Those involved in post-abortion counselling can already recall chilling descriptions from women who have followed the referral process into an abortion in order to end a crisis pregnancy, only to discover that they now have the consequences of that decision to deal with. The sad fact is that a decision made in a time of crisis which offers an immediate, short-term solution cannot be considered ‘informed consent’. What is worse, the moment these women sign the papers, they effectively sign away their right to redress if they later experience any of medical or psychological problems associated with crisis, trauma and loss.”
An anti-abortion group is outraged at what it calls Hamilton Family Planning’s plan to “kill on premises”.
Right to Life wrote to all MPs outlining the major problems in the Family Planning Association’s application to the Abortion Supervisory Committee for a license to commit abortions, below is an excerpt,
Voice for Life put out a press release on 23 October expressing their opposition to Family Planning’s application for a license to commit abortions (initially) at their Hamilton branch,
