Last Updated:Friday - 09/24/2010

Inconsistency on the unborn

The House of Commons has supported a non-binding resolution by the New Democratic Party to have graphic labels warning about the dangers of fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS) on the bottles on alcoholic beverages.

While the dangers of FAS are relatively well-known, excessive alcohol consumption by pregnant women remains the leading cause of developmental damage to children born in Canada. Warning labels on beer and liquor bottles might well serve as a timely reminder that could save some children untold hardship throughout their lives.

FAS is the leading cause of mental retardation. As well, children born with the syndrome have trouble learning the consequences of their previous behaviour and are prone to criminal behaviour. It is estimated that one-third of the Canadian prison population suffers the effects of fetal alcohol consumption.

Children born with FAS have permanent disorders of memory function, impulse control and judgment. Over the course of a lifetime, each person born with FAS costs the government an average of $6 million in direct service costs.

Catholic Social Services is in the midst of a three-year pilot project working with women who are at high risk of giving birth to children with FAS. The program provides a wide range of supports ranging from education to housing and legal issues. Most women are making remarkable progress.

So while printing warning labels on beer bottles is a far cry from what is needed to help potential mothers often in desperate straits, it would certainly be one step forward. It would heighten awareness in the general population and could well prevent some cases of FAS.

Still, one must point to the inconsistency of the NDP and other parties who supported their resolution. While they are rightly willing to challenge alcohol consumption that severely undermines the health of the child in the womb, they refuse to admit that the child has the right to life. The fetus has a right to good health, but not a right to life. We should try to prevent the mother from consuming alcohol during pregnancy, but we should not in any way restrain her from killing that child if she so chooses.

This is the hypocrisy of the pro-choice movement. On one hand, it wants to protect children; on the other hand, it will not admit that the child is a child. If a child is born with FAS, this is a great tragedy; if it is slain in the womb and dismembered into small pieces, this is a morally neutral exercise of something that is supposedly good - a woman's right to choose.

It is inconsistencies like this that lead to a higher rate of suicide among women who have recently had abortions. An extensive U.S. study reported in last week's WCR found that the suicide rate for women who had abortions was 7.8 per 100,000 while for women who had delivered babies but not had an abortion it was 3.0. Another study found that a teenage girl is 10 times more likely to commit suicide if she's had an abortion in the past six months.

These are women who in their hearts knew that a fetus is a child no matter what you call him or her. So also it would seem the 217 MPs who voted for the NDP resolution on FAS warning labels want to treat the unborn as human. Now if we could only get our country to think consistently about the nature of the unborn child.

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