weekly update, 14 November

weekly update, 14 November An international medical conference in Lisbon, Portugal, has examined the serious psychological and medical consequences experienced by millions of women who have had abortions. The Conference on Human Life Studies, which was promoted by the Women in Action Association, noted that, according to a US study, 19% of women experience some sort of emotional problem stemming from their abortions, and another study cited gave a range of 20-30 per cent. [LifeSite, 12 November ] SPUC was represented at the conference. Labour MPs will not be instructed by their party how to vote when they debate the government's Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill, which was introduced to parliament last week. [Mirror, 10 November ] A member of the House of Lords who is also president of the Royal Society of Medicine wants the bill to be amended so that it will permit the supply of hormonal birth-control pills without prescription. Baroness Finlay of Llandaff reportedly wants a member of the Commons to propose this as an amendment to the bill. [Daily Mail, 10 November , and Telegraph, 12 November ] Campaigners for a tightening of abortion law are due to show video of scans of unborn children to parliamentarians. [Independent, 10 November ] New government figures have shown that 375 elderly people in the midlands starved to death in the last 10 years, many of them residents of nursing homes and hospitals. In 2006 four out of 10 elderly people admitted to hospitals were malnourished. The Department of Health stressed it was doing all it could to prevent the deaths of elderly patients, and it recently launched the Nutrition Action Plan. [Sunday Mercury, 12 November ] The Uruguayan senate has approved, by 18 votes to 13, a measure to expand access to abortion. The bill would create an entitlement to abortion during the first three months for any reason, and would allow abortion until birth in cases of developmental anomaly or danger to the mother's life. Archbishop Cotugno of Montevideo deplored the manipulation of procedures that allowed a bill, which failed three weeks ago, to be reintroduced so soon. Mr Tabaré Vázquez, the country's president and an obstetrician, has promised to veto any attempt to decriminalise abortion. [LifeSite, 6 November ] A Swiss assisted-suicide charity is offering its services in car-parks in Zurich. Two men reportedly died in their cars from an overdose of barbiturates supplied to them in a suburban car-park by Dignitas. Authorities refused to renew the organisation's lease on a flat (apartment) after complaints from residents. [Telegraph, 9 November ] A US district judge has issued an injunction saying that pharmacists who refuse to sell morning-after pills on grounds of conscience are protected in doing so if they refer the patient on to a local source of the drug. A group of pharmacists challenging Washington state's requirement that they do not refuse to supply the drugs petitioned for a ruling while their lawsuit is in progress. [AP on Guardian, 9 November ]