Do they care about women’s pain?

The Editor: In her letter published on Monday June 7, 2004, Dopwell speaks of the harmful effects of abortion in the context that ASPIRE is promoting the practice of abortion.  In fact, it is the “Gang at ASPIRE”, as she put it, that has been drawing attention to the adverse effects on women’s health of the 20,000 abortions which already take place in Trinidad and Tobago each year. A quarter of them result in such severe complications as to cause admissions to our public wards.

It is the criminal law prohibiting abortion in Trinidad and Tobago that is causing women to damage their health and lose their lives, not ASPIRE.  This is the classic case of killing the messenger. It is ASPIRE that has been advocating for a civil law which will regulate the practice of abortion and ensure that procedures are carried out under the supervision of trained professionals and in circumstances where there is an opportunity for pre and post counselling, including encouraging the uptake of contraception. By the way, you can bet that Dopwell is not in favour of the use of the many scientifically reliable methods of contraception which would prevent women from falling victim to unwanted pregnancies in the first place.

We at ASPIRE are not in favour of abortion, nor do we advocate that women should have abortions. We have never said that is the answer to Trinidad’s problems, as Ms Dopwell suggests. We are in favour of replacing the harmful and undeveloped abortion law which has been on our statute books since the 1860’s and which fosters the thousands of unsafe procedures each year. The use of dilation and curettage (D&C) under general anaesthetic is the standard treatment in our public hospitals for completing the unsafe abortions of the 4,000 women admitted to our public hospitals each year. That procedure has been outdated for more than a generation, since the development of vacuum aspiration and paracervical block (MVA). 

This more modern procedure does not require an operating theatre.  It is far safer and cheaper.  Used with soft tip cannula, the risk of perforation is virtually eliminated. There is significantly less blood, less pain, less damage to the endometrium and the procedure is shorter. By shifting from D&C to MVA we could change one of our leading causes of admission of women to hospitals almost entirely into an out-patient, day service, thereby releasing some 30 percent of our gynaecological beds. Naturally we expect Dopwell et al to resist such an initiative. Yet they claim to be concerned about women’s pain.

LYNETTE SEEBARAN SUITE
ASPIRE