Rónán Mullen (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I am speaking to subsection (7) in the amendment which would prohibit the sale of body parts. I was just about to refer to what Mr. Winter referred to as the case of Professor Leonard Hayflick and how at a certain point in 1962, following a legal abortion at a Swedish hospital, the lungs from a female foetus were flown from Stockholm to his laboratory. From them, he established the strain that led to the provision of licensed human virus vaccines. Of course, people are idealistic and want to find cures. However, when we allow primary injustices to happen such as the abortion of unborn children, we should not be surprised when a demand for further instrumentalisation emerges. I submit and hope colleagues will agree that we must resist the temptation to eat the fruit of the poisoned tree and refuse to use, for the benefit of other humans, the results of the injustice perpetrated on the unborn via abortion. Of course, if someone does not believe it is an injustice, I can understand why he or she might not have a problem with the derivation of other benefits from the death of a child. However, there are many, including many "Yes" voters, who draw the line at further indignity being perpetrated on the unborn for scientific or other purposes. It is in that context that the issue of the sale of body parts arises. The amendment would specifically exclude the sale or the offer to sell a foetus or the bodily remains of any part thereof. Subsection (8) reads: "A person who carries out any experiment or procedure not authorised by this Act on the bodily remains of a foetus or any part thereof who has been the subject of a termination of pregnancy shall be guilty of an offence".

They are just two of the ten subsections proposed. I do not propose to take up further time by going through the rest of the subsections, but the two I have outlined are particularly important because they go to the heart of why the amendment is necessary. They are proposed for the purpose of showing a modicum of human dignity and mercy, albeit in death, to the memory of the child who was not let live but who, nonetheless, is entitled to some respect as a member of the human community for however short a time it is.