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Baby born before the abortion limit now a year old and thriving

Baby Isla was born 18 weeks early and given only a 10% chance of survival. A year on, she’s thriving and has just celebrated her first birthday.

Lauren Ormston and Oliver Dewey were expecting their first child together in July last year. But their daughter, baby Isla, had different plans. Everything seemed to be going as it should until early March when Lauren was around 22 weeks pregnant.

She started experiencing severe abdominal pains and went to the hospital that night where doctors told her that she was going into labour and it was unlikely her baby would survive.

Lauren was taken to St Peter’s Hospital in Chertsey, southwest of London. She arrived at the hospital at 7.30pm and within two hours had given birth to her daughter who weighed just 535g.

She had a 10% chance of survival

“The birth was easy, and I only had gas and air”, Lauren said, but things were not so easy for baby Isla.

“I could only cuddle Isla for six minutes before she was taken”, her mum said. “She looked so small and fragile like she would snap at the slightest bit of movement”.

Isla was so premature she had a bleed in her brain and a hole in her heart and spent six weeks on a ventilator.

“I lived each day, never knowing if she would make it, day by day, hour by hour, minute by minute”, Lauren said. It was difficult for her parents to give her a cuddle because of all the tubes getting in the way.

When she was just two months old, she lost sight in one eye and surgeons were unable to fix it. But by her due date, on 12 July, four months after she was actually born, she weighed 4kg and was able to go home with her parents. 

Now, a little over a year old. She weighs 7kg, can sit up and crawl and even stand with a little help.

“Looking at her now, you wouldn’t know she was premature”, Lauren said. “She’s a proper little madam now, she’s got her own personality, and is the most independent little girl ever”.

“[W]e live for each day because you don’t know what’s around the corner. We are just grateful for what we have, so grateful she was strong enough to defeat the odds and prove everyone wrong”, she added.

Right To Life UK spokesperson Catherine Robinson said “Isla is yet another baby born before the abortion limit in the UK. Such cases are a continued challenge to our abortion law, which allows abortion up to 24 weeks.”

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Dear reader,

Despite the Leadbeater assisted-suicide Bill passing its Third Reading on 20 June, it scraped through by just 23 votes (314-291) after enjoying a 55-vote majority at Second Reading. Had 12 more MPs switched sides, the Bill would be dead. It now limps into the Lords with a wafer-thin majority, where peers can amend, delay or reject it outright.

THE CHALLENGE

Dignity in Dying, My Death My Decision and Humanists UK have poured millions into pushing assisted suicide and will fight hard to stop the Lords overturning the Bill.

At the same time, the Antoniazzi abortion-up-to-birth amendment, passed by MPs in June, also heads to the Lords. If it becomes law, it would no longer be illegal for women to perform their own abortions for any reason – including sex-selective purposes – and at any point up to and during birth.

We will be up against the UK’s largest abortion providers, BPAS and MSI Reproductive Choices (formerly Marie Stopes), who are expected to push for even more extreme changes to our abortion laws in the Lords.

WE NEED YOUR HELP

Thousands of vulnerable lives are now at stake. Battling these two threats is the biggest and most expensive effort in our history, and has drained our limited resources. To fight effectively on both fronts, we aim to raise £200,000 by midnight this Sunday (13 July 2025).

Every donation, large or small, will help protect lives, and UK taxpayers can add 25p to every £1 through Gift Aid at no extra cost.

Will you make a donation now to help protect vulnerable lives from these major threats?

URGENT
APPEAL
to protect vulnerable lives

Help stop three major anti-life threats.

Help fight major assisted suicide and abortion up to birth threats.