News – Lords vote for inhumanity

ET staff writer
ET staff writer
01 March, 2008 1 min read

Lords vote for inhumanity

An amendment to the Abortion Act to end discrimination against disabled foetuses has been rejected in the House of Lords. Baroness Masham’s amendment would have repealed the current law, which says an unborn child may be aborted up to the point of birth if it may suffer from a ‘serious handicap’. In the past ‘serious handicap’ has been interpreted as including conditions like cleft palate. Sadly, her amendment was rejected by a vote of 22 to 89.

At the same time as the Lords were rejecting her amendment, Professor Sunny Anand was addressing a House of Commons meeting on foetal pain. Professor Anand is the world’s leading expert in this area, and his research suggests that babies can feel pain even before 24 weeks gestation – the current time limit for abortion of babies without a disability.

Those at the meeting, organised by Nadine Dorries MP, were also addressed by Professor Stuart Campbell, whose 4D images of babies in the womb have been instrumental in convincing many of the humanity of the unborn child.

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