Recent press reports have buoyed the spirits of men and women who believe in the primacy of human dignity and human happiness. An SBS television report claimed that since 1981 there has been a 30% reduction in the number of abortions performed in the USA. The other ground breaking news was that Japanese and American researchers have induced pluripotent stem cells from somatic skin cells, which should permanently render unnecessary the destruction of embryos to access the same pluripotent stem cells.
Researchers in the USA have not yet definitively determined an explanation for the dramatic reduction in abortion over the last 25 years. It is most probably because a generation of women who readily accessed abortion are now discovering the unhappiness their decision to abort has produced. Reputable medical researchers have documented the adverse mental health sequelae associated with abortion. Invariably, these studies report increased incidence of depression, self harm and sleep disturbance in women following an abortion. These mental health disorders suggest a malaise and unhappiness which is occuring in women following abortion. Pro-life advocates take no satisfaction from these studies.
The effort of pro-life organisations to reduce abortion numbers results from a deep feeling of charity and generosity towards women weighed down by the perception that she has no realistic options other than to abort. Our actions should reflect a deep desire to ensure every person’s happiness. Abortion, by its very nature, cannot increase a woman’s happiness. Studies repeatedly show adverse mental health effects whichproduce much unhappiness. These are not idle, hypocritical statements aimed at imposing behaviour on women which seeks to deny them the opportunities and aspirations to build a more equitable society. Rather, we have a deep sense of solidarity with each woman’s plight. We realise that occasionally, a pregnancy can produce a profound sense of abandonment and despair in a woman. The decision to continue with the pregnancy is a heroic one but once chosen virtually ensures that over the long term her life will be more fulfilled and joyful. Reduction in abortion numbers is surely the aim of pro-choice advocates and abortion providers as well as pro-lifers.
Over the past few years, parliaments around Australia have debated the ethics of accessing embryonic stem cells from excess IVF embryos and cloned human embryos. Invariably, they have given the green light to this research in the knowledge that the research results in the death of the embryo, upholding the utilitarian principle that embryonic human life could be sacrificed on the unproven premise that the research would cure a host of debilitating conditions. However, these recent reports that pluripotent stem cells could be induced utilising somatic skin cells highlight the fact that medical research can just as effectively operate within ethical boundaries as it can outside those boundaries.
Embryonic stem cell research was allowing science to dominate humankind with no respect for the dignity of the human embryo. This new research will achieve the same results but will put science back at the service of humanlkind and not humankind at the service of science. This research again proves the point that ethical research can produce scientific breakthroughs without compromising human dignity and human life.