News,

British abortionists have produced an information leaflet to help men deal with abortion. The publication is an initiative of the British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS), the UK's largest private abortion provider, and has been endorsed by the pro-abortion Family Planning Association. A street survey of 200 men commissioned by BPAS suggested that, while a majority of men would support the decision of a wife or girlfriend to have an abortion, most felt that there was insufficient information for men. Ann Furedi, BPAS director of communications, said that it was right that men had no legal rights when it came to abortion, but that "it makes sense to help men feel as comfortable as possible about the issue". [BBC News online, 13 May ] Paul Tully, general secretary of SPUC, commented: "The abortionists appear to be reacting to the growing public perception of abortion as an injustice to men. Fathers are denied not only the chance to defend their unborn child, but even the right to know of the child's existence. The more tragic fact is that many men abdicate responsibility for their child or pressurise the mother to abort." The French senate has voted by more than two to one against the extension of the legal gestational time limit for abortions. Senators voted by 216 to 100 to reject a draft law which would extend the limit from 10 to 12 weeks, although a definitive vote on the proposal is scheduled for next month. [EWTN News, 11 May ] A prominent campaigner for euthanasia in Italy has passed away. Emilio Vesce, whose Radical party campaigned successfully for the introduction of abortion in Italy, had been in a coma since suffering a heart attack last November. Mr Vesce's son vowed that his father's crusade to legalise euthanasia would continue. [AP, via New Jersey online, 12 May] It is reported that distribution of the abortifacient morning-after pill will begin in Spain today. While the Spanish Association of Catholic Pharmacists has called on its members to refuse to sell the drug, some health authorities are planning to make it available free of charge. The official go-ahead for distribution of the morning-after pill in Spain was given on 23 March. [Zenit , 12 May] The issue of abortion is said to be assuming increasing prominence in Kazakstan, a country of 15 million people and around 300,000 abortions each year. Pro-life groups in the country are mounting a vigorous campaign. Alibek Khadji, imam at the main mosque in Almaty, the country's one-time capital, is one of those who plans to urge the government to reverse the permissive abortion legislation dating from Soviet times. [Institute for War and Peace Reporting, 11 May ] The supreme court of Arkansas has ruled that an unborn child should be considered a person in a wrongful death lawsuit. A lower court had come to the opposite conclusion in the case of a mother and her unborn child who had both died during birth procedures at a state hospital in 1995. Overturning that decision, the supreme court took into account a 1999 state law which included unborn children from 12 weeks' gestation in its definition of a person. [Washington Post and Zenit , 11 May] An American newspaper has highlighted the story of Alexandria Nicole Saia, who was born on 5 April after surviving an abortion procedure. Nicole Saia, the baby's 18-year-old mother, opted for an abortion but realised that she did not want her baby to die two days after being injected with the drug methotrexate, a chemotherapy drug used to abort unborn children. The abortion clinic informed Nicole that her unborn child would already be dead, but an ultrasound test indicated that the baby was still alive and a doctor prescribed leukovorin in an attempt to counteract the effect of the abortifacient chemical. Alexandria was born healthy. [St Petersburg Times, Florida, 13 May ]