Garth A. Rattray | Dr Daniel Thomas radicalised my message

She sat before me, a picture of panic. Eleven years before I saw her, she almost died during her last pregnancy because her blood pressure skyrocketed during the last trimester. When I saw her, she was significantly overweight, diabetic, hyperlipidaemic and severely hypertensive, with occasional abnormal heart rhythms. Her blood pressure was very resistant to treatment and, to top it all off, a condom had ruptured, and she just missed her period. She was 48 years old and had her three children to live for.

Although she was supposed to be on medications, her blood pressure was 165/100 mm/Hg. And when I told her that her urine test for pregnancy was positive, I thought that she was going to collapse right in front of me.

She was a medical catastrophe waiting to happen. She was pregnant and in deep trouble. She looked straight at me and said that she can’t carry that pregnancy because it was sure to kill her. I did not know where she could procure an abortion, and I never assisted in or carried out any such procedure because it goes against my beliefs, but I too surmised that trying to carry that foetus posed a very real and extreme danger to her life, so I told her that I did not blame her for wanting to terminate that pregnancy.

That is a true story, and there are many more like that. Women get pregnant although they are suffering from raging lupus. They get pregnant with active cancers. They get pregnant with severe heart problems and kidney disease and heaven knows what else. Women with severe health problems who get pregnant, could or will die because of the pregnancy. This depends on the severity of the existing condition.

According to our existing law, even if such a woman will certainly die if she continues to carry that foetus, she must carry it and die, even though her death will also mean the death of that foetus. That does not make sense to me. In reality, such women seek (illegal) abortions because our laws make no exceptions for saving their lives under any circumstances. There are very obvious and inherent dangers to (illegal) abortions; therefore, it seems commonsensical to me that our laws be amended to allow women in extreme danger from pregnancies to have terminations on medical grounds.

SAVE ONE RATHER THAN LOSE TWO

When reading The Gleaner’s Letter of the Day (Saturday, 29 February, 2020), I wondered why Dr Daniel Thomas went as far as he did in criticising my piece that sought to have the abortion pill taken off the streets. But then I realised that Dr Thomas describes himself as a “…young, radical, Christian young man fulfilling all God’s dreams for me. .That says it all. Dr Thomas is young, he said it twice for emphasis, and he is a radical person who knows God’s dreams.

For effect, Dr Thomas unscientifically labels foetuses as “unborn babies”. And, in order to unfairly vilify me, this self-proclaimed Christian describes gruesome second-and third-trimester abortions although I have NEVER advocated such procedures.

He also criticises, describing foetuses as the “potential for human life”, although Jamaica only recognises a baby as a ‘life in being’ AFTER the baby takes its first breath and the umbilical cord is severed. That is why criminals who kill pregnant women (even at term) are only charged for the murder of the woman, the foetus is not even considered.

Very young Dr Thomas fails to realise the blatantly obvious. Ignoring the need to protect the health and lives of women who are significantly endangered by a pregnancy will continue proliferating illegal abortions and their terrible sequelae. I think that it’s better to save one than to lose two.

Garth A. Rattray is a medical doctor with a family practice. Email feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com and garthrattray@gmail.com.