Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I wrote to the Chairman and thank her for the opportunity to speak.

I want the Chair to note that I absolutely reject the allegations made against me by Senator Jerry Buttimer in my absence last week, he accused me of glibly quoting what he described as reports from Duke University and suggested that I was doing so in a manner that was dishonest.

I want to put it on record that the research I referred to was performed at one of the premier universities in America and in the world. It was published in a respected peer reviewed medical journal entitled Prenatal Diagnosis. If Deputy Buttimer and his consultants had more carefully reviewed this study they would have noted that the authors recruited the majority of participants from a pre-existing study database, the Hereditary Basis of Neural Tube Defects study conducted at Duke University Medical Center and only approximately one third of the participants originated from social media. Objective reporting on the study would recognise that the authors reported a possible bias based on the recruitment source; they recognised that there was a difference in severity of symptoms in the two groups, and recognising this potential influence on results, made source of referral a covariate in the analysis to limit the source impact.

Cope et al. is a comparative study of women and their outcomes after terminating or carrying a child with anencephaly to term. It is not, as some might believe after listening to Senator Buttimer and Professor Fergal Malone, simply a report from women recruited from social media who carried a child to term with anencephaly. This study offers important insights into outcomes for women after termination of pregnancy following a diagnosis of anencephaly in contrast with outcomes where the pregnancy was continued. To dismiss this study is scientifically unreasonable but it might be understandable if there were significant data to suggest that termination of the life of an infant with anencephaly had no impact on mothers or improved the medical health of mothers later in life. The fact is there is no such study and all we are left with is the unsupported opinions of those who are committed to the expansion of abortion services. It is dismaying to see anyone being dismissive of research that identifies poor mental health outcomes for women related to abortion after a diagnosis of anencephaly simply because they do not suit a pro-abortion narrative.