Baby with anencephaly celebrates 1 yr of life
It was wonderful to see that CNN picked up a Colorado story about little Nicholas Coke (“St. Nicholas”, the reporter even called him). It is usually more convenient for the media to present babies with anencephaly as having the most abortion-worthy of conditions, typically in defense of policies protecting late-term abortion and tax-payer funded abortions. Kudos to CNN and the original NBC affiliate for sharing another more positive perspective. Though it is true that most babies with anencephaly will die soon after birth, they are no less worthy of the dignity of being carried to term, and they bestow upon their parents the same dignity that all babies do – that of being parents.
Baby born without a brain lives for first birthday
By Nicole Vandeputte
Anencephaly is not a “genetic disease”. It is a neural tube defect which can have genetic causes but most of the time is not.
You are right, Carrie.
A college classmate of mine conceived an anencephalic infant who she planned to carry to full term, knowing full well the normally poor prognosis. However, toward the end of the second trimester, she developed eclampsia which the doctors were unable to control and at that point she was advised to induce labor (as the Santorums did with their trisomy 18 when Karen Santorum developed a life-threatening infection due to a congenital defect in the baby). Apparently there was a major chance that she would die if she continued the pregnancy. She chose to induce labor. That was her first pregnancy. Today, she is the mother of three healthy sons. Unless you believe that she should have lost her life, sometimes late term abortions (hers and the Santorums) are done to save the mother’s life. It’s not always a matter of convenience.
The ethical and only treatment (after a certain point) for that condition is delivery of the baby. The delivery had nothing to do with the baby’s condition. Delivery for preeclampsia can be morally required in pregnancies with perfectly healthy babies (but sadly, not yet viable) as well as those with disabling or fatal conditions. Here is a document which may help you understand the difference between early induction as treatment and early induction as abortion. http://ncbcenter.org/page.aspx?pid=482&storyid1277=80&ncs1277=3