ACT Right to Life Association MEDIA RELEASE

Call for the Health Minister to reject the NHMRC abortion report

Health Minister Carmen Lawrence was today called on to reject the National Health and Medical Research Council's (NHMRC) draft consultation document Services for the Termination of Pregnancy in Australia: A Review (the Report). President of the ACT Right to Life Association, Jeremy Stuparich, described the Report as a clumsy attempt to force acceptance of abortion on the Australian community.

In a detailed submission presented to the NHMRC today, the ACT Right to Life Association makes a number of points, including the following:

• there is no justification for health authorities, especially in rural areas, to enhance access to abortion, especially at the expense of other services;
• promotion of abortion services through every community organisation is unnecessary and is insensitive to diverse cultural and moral attitudes towards abortion. The authors' attitude to aboriginal fertility is particularly patronising;
• the treatment of physical consequences of abortion to women's health is inadequate and neglects evidence of considerable risk to reproductive health;
• the attack on counselling services which do not refer for abortion is discriminatory and unjustified, particularly as the authors support suppressing information to the pregnant woman about her baby's development; and,
• the authors' insistence on special counselling and management support for staff engaged in abortion services is striking witness that the majority of medical and nursing staff do not approve of the procedure nor wish to be involved in it.

The ACT Right to Life Association's submission on the Report is attached to this media release. The deadline for submissions on the Report is today.

Issued: 3 November 1995

Contact: Jeremy Stuparich, president of the ACT Right to Life Association

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