On October 28th, 2012, Savita Halappanavar died of multiple organ failure. Her husband was reported to have said that if she had been allowed abortion, she would have been alive today. May be so! However, what is not clear is that even if the doctors had invoked their Christian belief to refuse abortion, the doctors were supposed to do every possible things they could do to save her life, even if it means harming the very life of the foetus. So in the process of trying to save the mother's life, if the foetus dies, that does not go against Christian's belief. Anyway, the exact event leading to the death of Savita may become clearer later -- or let's hope so! And once it's clear I trust that the government would take appropriate measure.
For now I wish to examine if curbing abortion or allowing abortion is more appropriate from the justice point of view. There is this proponent of pro-life on one side and proponent of pro-choice on the other side who are debating on the matter. Proponent of pro-choice argues that the woman should have the right to choose whereas proponent of pro-life argues that the foetus should have the right to life. In this debate, I see that the question whether the foetus is a human person or not is inevitable. If the foetus is found to be a human person, then the question arises whether the woman has the right to terminate the human person inside or whether the right of the human person inside to life trumps over the right of the woman to terminate.And when it is put this way, it boils down to the fact that even if a human person is parasitic no human person has the right to take away other person's life.
So back to the question: is the foetus inside a human person? Well, how do we define a human person? It's complex! But to settle a philosophical question let's ask whether it's the fertilized egg that is called a human person or whether it's the development of consciousness that makes the egg a human person or whether it's the egg that is born that should be called a human person. Now if it's the consciousness that makes an egg a human person, then we get into problem regarding the status of those adult who are brain dead or who are in the worst stage of coma. And it would be rather bizarre to consider that only when the foetus lands on the earth then we confer the status "human" on that nine months old foetus! The most intelligible way to me is to hold that it's the fertilized egg that should be called "thou"; the "it" ceases once the egg and the sperm meet.
Considering this thought progression I don't think it is justice to do away with law on abortion. If such a law is done away with, many human persons would face clinical death every day. The death of Savita Halappanavar is unfortunate. But doing away abortion law is not the answer to rectifying the system. Justice to Praveen and Savita lies elsewhere; not in doing away the abortion law.
