With both houses of parliament voting to hand control of the drug RU486 to the Therapeutic Drugs Administration, women who choose to abort their pregnancy now have a choice as to how that abortion will be carried out. At least, they will soon be able to use RU486 to terminate their unborn child if they have made the choice to abort before the 6-8 weeks period during which the drug is effective. Given that the debate was not supposed to be about whether abortions should be allowed but whether women ought to have a choice about how abortions are carried out, sanity seems to have prevailed.
Some people of considerable influence, however, did their best to make the debate about abortion itself. Tony Abbott, the Health Minister, was one of these people. He made no bones about bringing his religious beliefs to the debate. This raises a whole heap of questions about separation/integration of religion into politics, but this post won’t be asking any of those questions. Rather, the object of this post is to highlight what I think is very valid point made by the Health Minister:
We have a bizarre double standard in this country where someone who kills a pregnant woman’s baby is guilty of murder, but a woman who aborts an unborn baby is simply exercising choice.
Although some have described Mr Abbott’s statement as "unfortunate" (notably Amanda Vanstone), to me, as somebody who is generally pro-choice, this poses a real moral dilemma, which cannot be dismissed and simply swept under the carpet. Unfortunately, I don’t see how this dilemma can be adequately resolved.