Duc in Altum

The longer you simply think about the realities of abortion, the easier it becomes to separate truth from fiction. If you stop actually thinking about what is touted in the name of supporting abortion, you may believe things that simply cannot be so. For instance, the idea that during an abortion, the unborn child does not experience pain is an idea that really makes no sense unless you simply want to believe it is so despite even the most basic of common sense.

Even if one has no idea about the development of a baby in the womb, you know that at some point during the 40 weeks of gestation, the child must have developed the ability to be sensitive to pain. Why? Because the child is born with the ability to experience pain. Consequently, because an abortion can be performed up to the moment of birth, there is some time when an abortion can be performed on a baby who is able to experience pain. Add to this the actual details of a so-called partial-birth abortion which are grisly indeed, and you realize that any child who can sense pain who undergoes this evil procedure will know great amounts of pain.

Simple logic brings us to the point that it is a given that a late term abortion will cause a child to experience unbelievable pain. Scientific evidence which has investigated the unborn child's ability to experience pain, takes the matter to another level. As Fr. Pavone's recent column points out, there is much evidence that abortion is extremely painful for unborn children.

On April 6, 2004, the following testimony was given in U.S. District Court (District of Nebraska) by Dr. Kanwaljeet Anand before Judge Richard G. Kopf in the case of Leroy Carhart, M.D., et. al. v. Ashcroft

"Q. So, Doctor, do you have an opinion as to whether the partial-birth abortion procedure causes pain to the fetus?

A. If the fetus is beyond 20 weeks of gestation, I would assume that there will be pain caused to the fetus. And I believe it will be severe and excruciating pain caused to the fetus.

Q. What do you mean by severe and excruciating pain?

A. You see, the threshold for pain is very low. The fetus is very likely extremely sensitive to pain during the gestation of 20 to 30 weeks. And so the procedures associated with the partial-birth abortion that I just described would be likely to cause severe pain, right from the time the fetus is being manipulated and being handled to the time that the incision is made, and the brain or the contents, intracranial contents, are sucked out."

In 1994, an article in the prestigious British medical journal, the Lancet, revealed hormonal stress reactions in the fetus. The article concluded with the recommendation that painkillers be used when surgery is done on the fetus. The authors wrote, "This applies not just to diagnostic and therapeutic procedures on the fetus, but possibly also to termination of pregnancy, especially by surgical techniques involving dismemberment." In 1991, scientific advisors to the Federal Medical Council in Germany had made a similar recommendation.