PRESS RELEASE – FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Foetal Sentience Committee Bill receives Second Reading in the House of Lords
Tomorrow, Lord Moylan’s Foetal Sentience Committee Bill will receive its Second Reading in the House of Lords.
The Foetal Sentience Committee Bill intends to create a committee that will operate on an ongoing basis as a source of evidence-based, scientific expertise on the sentience of the human foetus in the light of developments in scientific and medical knowledge, and the Committee will advise the Government on the formulation of relevant policy and legislation.
The Bill was launched in November last year and is especially significant given the rapid developments in scientific knowledge relating to the development of the unborn child as well as developments in medical science since the Abortion Act was passed in 1967, and the abortion time limit was last changed over 30 years ago in 1990.
The Bill is being debated ahead of a vote in the House of Commons on Caroline Ansell’s landmark amendment to the Criminal Justice Bill to lower the abortion limit to 22 weeks.
The Government has acknowledged that unborn babies undergoing surgery for spina bifida from 20 weeks gestation on the NHS receive pain relief. Tragically, at this same gestation, babies undergoing abortion “via surgical dilatation and evacuation (D&E)” are not routinely provided pain relief, nor are babies aborted after 22 weeks via “feticide, where potassium chloride is injected into the heart of the fetus”.
A 2020 All Party Parliamentary Group report summarised the extensive developments in medical science and academic research that point to the same conclusion: it is likely that babies in the womb can feel pain, possibly from as early as 12 weeks gestation, with some evidence suggesting even earlier.
The report also highlighted inconsistencies in UK law – currently, the killing of ‘protected animals’ from “two-thirds” of gestation is subject to tighter legal regulation than unborn humans being aborted from the same stage. Sections 1, 2(7) and 15A, and Schedules 1 and 2 of the Animals (Scientific Procedures) Act 1986 stipulate how animal foetuses must be killed in ‘humane’ ways, whilst no parallel legal provision exists for human foetuses.
In the decade to 2019 alone, the survival rate for extremely premature babies born at 23 weeks doubled, prompting new guidance from the British Association of Perinatal Medicine that enables doctors to intervene to save premature babies from 22 weeks gestation.
This leaves a real contradiction in British law: in one room of a hospital, doctors could be working to save a baby born alive at 23 weeks, whilst, in another room of that same hospital, a doctor could perform an abortion that would end the life of a baby at the same stage.
A spokesperson for Right To Life UK, Catherine Robinson, said:
“There have been rapid developments in scientific knowledge relating to the development of the unborn child since the Abortion Act was passed in 1967 and the abortion time limit was last changed over 30 years ago in 1990”.
“Experts are increasingly providing evidence that suggests that unborn babies may feel pain from as early as 12 weeks gestation, well before our current 24-week abortion limit. Such evidence should be taken into account in our abortion law and when the Government is developing policy”.
“The Government has acknowledged that unborn babies undergoing surgery for spina bifida from 20 weeks gestation on the NHS receive pain relief. Tragically, at this same gestation babies undergoing abortion are not routinely provided pain relief”.
“This Bill will create a committee that operates on an ongoing basis as a source of evidence-based, scientific expertise on the sentience of the unborn child, that will advise the government on the formulation of relevant policy and legislation”.
ENDS
- For additional quotes and media interviews contact press@righttolife.org.uk or 07774 483 658.
- For further information on Right To Life UK visit www.righttolife.org.uk
