Thursday, April 15, 2010

PAIN

A new approach. This from Yahoo, AP:
Nebraska lawmakers on Tuesday passed a groundbreaking bill banning abortions at 20 weeks based on assertions that fetuses feel pain then. Gov. Dave Heineman planned to sign it into law in the afternoon.

If upheld by the courts, the bill could change the foundation of abortion laws nationwide. Current restrictions in Nebraska and elsewhere are based on a fetus's ability to survive outside the womb, or viability.

Viability is determined on a case-by-case basis but is generally considered to occur at 22 to 24 weeks.
Creative Minority Report has this on the language of the Nebraska legislation: The Legislature makes the following findings:
At least by twenty weeks after fertilization there is substantial evidence that an unborn child has the physical structures necessary to experience pain;(2) There is substantial evidence that, by twenty weeks after fertilization, unborn children seek to evade certain stimuli in a manner which in an infant or an adult would be interpreted as a response to pain; (3) Anesthesia is routinely administered to unborn children who have developed twenty weeks or more past fertilization who undergo prenatal surgery; (4) Even before twenty weeks after fertilization, unborn children have been observed to exhibit hormonal stress responses to painful stimuli. Such responses were reduced when pain medication was administered directly to such unborn children; and (5) It is the purpose of the State of Nebraska to assert a compelling state interest in protecting the lives of unborn children from the stage at which substantial medical evidence indicates that they are capable of feeling pain.
The one who feels the pain should receive the greatest moral attention, don't you think?

Let's hope it survives the legal challenges.

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