Recently in India a 15 year old girl who was 7 months pregnant approached the Supreme Court for an abortion, and the judges gave a verdict that since she’s a minor and this is a case of rape abortion should be allowed at any stage of gestation. They claimed that it is purely her choice. AIIMS ( all India institute of medical sciences and research) is a central government hospital (the best of the best essentially). They have come out and said that the abortion procedure at this stage is extremely risky to the mother as well, and since she is just 4 weeks from viability the best option would be to give birth to a live child and give them up for adoption. They said that there are high chances that the abortion procedure (which at this stage of gestation is essentially killing the child and inducing labour) would result in the delivery of a live child who would be disabled due to the procedure. So the most humane thing would be to just have a normal delivery.
The Supreme Court then said that the job of AIIMS is just to provide healthcare and not to make moral decisions , and said they are trying to equate fetus to child. They said the mother’s life is more important and giving birth to a love child would be traumatic.
And most people in India are supportive of this. Unfortunately in India both the left and right support abortion for their own twisted reasons - the left think that abortion is the only way to give independence and rights to women, whereas the right think that this is the way to prevent pre-marital pregnancies. Extremists of both sides love to use abortion for their own causes. They think they can use this as a way to control the growing population of India. Also honour killings happen a lot in India so of course people like that don’t see anything wrong in killing a fetus - they would rather kill an innocent child than “lose their respect in society” because of a child out of wedlock. In other countries if someone gets pregnant out of wedlock conservative families would probably get them married. But in India that doesn’t happen, because parents think only they should be able to choose their child’s spouse. Forced marriages are extremely common. And few extremists love to use abortion to commit female foeticide. No major political figure in India has ever spoken out against abortion and it really isn’t even a debate.
I was shocked at some of the comments I’ve seen about this case. People are saying that giving birth to a live child would be the most traumatic thing for the mother. At this stage even the abortion would require her giving birth !! Just to a dead child…
And nowhere in this whole discourse are they talking about the rapist and the punishment that should be given to him. Rape is horrific and yes, becoming pregnant via rape is traumatising. However if there is anyone that should die here it should be the rapist, not the innocent child. The mother’s life is not more valuable than the child, both of them are equal. Both require protection and rights. I really pray that both the mother and child remain safe and healthy ,and get the support and justice they need. May God bless them. And may people open their eyes to the evil of abortion