Thursday, November 15, 2012

Blog 12: Woman's death prompts abortion debate in Ireland


A tragic death of Savita Halappanavar happened because she was denied the right to have an abortion in Ireland.  Halappanavar was thirty one and she was seventeen months pregnant.  Ireland has strict abortion laws and will only allow an abortion under specific circumstances.  On October 21st Savita went into the hospital complaining of extreme back pain that wouldn’t go away.  The doctors at the hospital just told her she was experiencing a miscarriage and to basically let it pass within the continuing hours.  But Savita and her husband wanted to have an abortion because they pain was that unbearable but because of the abortion laws the medical staff was denying her that choice.  But the hours kept passing and nothing but more pain was happening to Savita.  Her husband was at her side the whole time and nothing was making sense to him if the doctors knew the baby wasn’t going to make it why not put his wife out of this pain and have it be finish quicker?  But the staff told them as long as a heartbeat is still occurring from the baby the abortion laws forbid them to do anything.  But after three days of being in the hospital Savita died of a blood infection called septicemia.  This led to many people being hurt and upset and has led to protests to change the abortion laws.  The abortion law in Ireland did state the abortion could be legal if the mother’s life was at risk so then why was this situation any different?  This tragic death of Savita has led to an investigation that is continuing.  One staff member did tell the couple that Catholic laws in Ireland forbade abortion.  But Savita and her husband aren’t Catholic so why must non- Catholics have to follow this law in Ireland?  

 http://www.cnn.com/2012/11/14/world/europe/ireland-abortion-controversy/index.html?hpt=he_c2

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