THE LIFE INSTITUTE has commented this morning on the story of a clinically brain dead pregnant woman who is being kept alive despite her families wishes.
It has been reported that the women, who is in her 20s, is 16 weeks pregnant and was brought to hospital two weeks ago after suffering a brain trauma due to a blood clot. She is currently being treated at Midlands Regional Hospital in Mullingar.
The story emerged yesterday, a day after the Minister for Health Leo Varadkar acknowledged that the country’s abortion laws are too restrictive and that women’s lives are being put at risk – despite the ienactment of the Protection in Life During Pregnancy legislation.
Life Institute spokeswoman Niamh Uí Bhriain told TheJournal.ie this morning that while it is a tough situation for everyone involved, there is the life of the unborn child to consider.
“Details only seem to be emerging but in this pregnancy, as with every pregnancy, there are two people involved and it seems that the medical staff here are trying to do their best in a very difficult situation”.
No one would like to see the baby’s life deliberately ended, after the tragedy with the mother.
The Institute had been critical of Varadkar’s speech this week, with Uí Bhriain saying yesterday that he was “trying to talk out of the two sides of his mouth on abortion”.
Fine Gael TD, Jerry Buttimer, who chaired the Oireachtas Health Committee through the whole process for the Protection in Life During Pregnancy legislation, said it is clear now that “the issue of abortion is not going to go away”.
“It is new legislation, it isn’t perfect but it is as far as the government can go without a constitutional referendum,” he said, on conversation with TheJournal.ie.
It’s a sensitive, complex and divisive issue. Trying to get the balance between the life of the mother and the life of the unborn child isn’t always black and white.
Buttimer said that the government must ensure that there is a clear pathway for both the medical profession and the legal profession in dealing with situations like this.
He has suggested a constitutional convention should be held on the issue, to allow a full spectrum of views from society to come together and hash out all of the issues.
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