Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Friday, 17 May 2013

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children

Heads of Protection of Life during Pregnancy Bill 2013: Public Hearings

2:15 pm

Photo of Mattie McGrathMattie McGrath (Tipperary South, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome our guests. At the hearings of the committee in January Dr. Mahony dismissed the notion of performing late-term abortions in Irish hospitals. However, this Bill contains no term limits. While she told The Irish Times that babies who were viable would be kept alive, there seems to be a legal question about a potential liability which arises for doctors who deliberately induce a physically healthy child who was being carried by a physically healthy mother. Even if viability becomes a term limit for abortions, I would like an answer to the following scenario. A woman presents in the 20th week of her pregnancy. She is suicidal and requests an abortion and this is granted. The 20-week old baby is not viable outside the womb but the baby has been fully formed for many weeks. The baby is quite big, perhaps up to 10 inches long, reacts to her mother's voice, can feel pain and the mother can feel movement. What I would like to know is what procedure Dr. Mahony or any Irish doctor operating under this proposal undertakes at this point to end the life of the child?

In the United Kingdom there are two methods used. Either a D and C is performed where the unborn baby is dismembered or the unborn baby is given an injection into the heart which causes it to have a fatal attack. Will either of these procedures be used in Irish hospitals? Are doctors in this country trained to perform these procedures?

I believe Dr. Sam Coulter-Smith made the point at the Medical Council recently that he had been forced to react to an IrishIndependentheadline in which he had been misquoted. I understand he has issues with the media.

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