International Right to Life Federation, Inc.
Vol. 14 No. 5
(September/October , 2003)

Russia Bans Late Abortions
On 17 June, the last commission to decide on this came down in favor of banning late abortions. Our information is from Father Maxim Obukhov, a Russian Orthodox Priest, whose duty it is to represent the patriarch, Alexi II, before the Dumas, (their parliament) and the world. It was directly through his efforts that the Willke's new book, Abortion Questions and Answers, was published in Russian. It was through his efforts that a free copy was sent to every priest and religious official throughout the Russian Federation, as well as to all lawmakers. In his letter to us he refers to the book and to the seminar the Willkes put on for Orthodox Priests in December 2001. He says, "I can say that you did much for this and deserve much of the merit."

Korean Birthrate Lowest Ever
The birth dearth is not only devastating Japan and being forced upon China, but it's happening in Korea also. Statistics are available since 1970. The total fertility rate i.e. the number of children born per woman in her lifetime was 1.3 children in 2001. In 2002 it dropped to 1.17. Back in 1970 it was 4.5. In 1980 it was 1.6, in 2000 it was 1.5 and so it continues to drop. It is interesting to recall that not too long ago this government was discouraging births and adopted a policy of only paying for schooling for two children per family.

World Bank Atlas 2002
This atlas reports that 25% of the Chinese population lack access to a source of safe water, whereas 83% of childbearing age women have access to contraception. In Vietnam it's 44% without safe water, but 75% who have contraception available.

Argentine Ban on Abortifacients
A judge in Argentina has ordered a ban on the production and sale of oral contraceptives and IUDs, citing the pill forms that are abortifacient. She also ordered existing supplies destroyed. This same judge had banned the morning-after abortion pill in 2001.

New Zealand Defeats Euthanasia Bill
In July, members of the NZ Parliament voted 60 to 57 to defeat a proposed referendum on euthanasia.

Marie Stopes Int. De-funded
The U.S. State Department in August stopped funding Marie Stopes International for an HIV/AIDS program because of its close ties with the UNFPA in China. This extremely influential group out of the UK has partnered with the UNFPA to set abortion programs in 32 counties in China. In a clarifying order, President Bush had instructed the State Department that the Mexico City policy, which prohibited the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) from funding pro-abortion groups, applies to federal funding of all population groups funded through the State Department, even if they are not funneled through USAID. This is truly a pro-life victory of substance. According to the Population Research Institute, Marie Stopes officials admitted that "manual vacuum aspirators (hand held suction devices) were being used to perform abortions up to and beyond 16 weeks," and that these were labeled "post abortion care" or "menstrual regulation."

U.S. House-Humans Are Not Merchandise
Believing that human embryos are people whose copyright belongs to God, Representative James Weldon (R-FL) was able to add an amendment to the Commerce Justice State Appropriations Bill on July 23. It forbids patenting a human clone or any portion thereof. It states, "No funds made available by the act may be used to issue patents on claims directed to or encompassing a human organism." This should very sharply discourage human cloning for research purposes, if it survives in the Senate.

American Academy of Pediatrics is "Hopeless"
The AAP's recent statement approving homosexual adoption, and its cavalier dismissal of dozens of protest resolutions, marked a new low for AAP. Its statement was poorly reasoned, scantily documented and admitted that it relied on an inadequate sample that was "small and unrepresentative." Its position is without question totally at variance from the grassroots opinion of the vast majority of members of AAP. In the past, through its un-elected executive committee, it has supported adolescent abortion without parental notification. It has promoted contraception as the solution to adolescent promiscuity and today's pandemic sexually transmitted diseases. It has espoused group-based, value-free sex education in the schools and the indoctrination of homosexual rights. Because these policies are given approval by an executive committee, which is appointed and unresponsive to the membership, a new organization is forming.

It has taken the name of the American College of Pediatricians. Its organization statement says that it was "born out of concern for the welfare of children in the traditional family … It recognizes that children today are at great risk emotionally and physically …It recognizes the inherent value of both a father and a mother together raising children … It objects to the current organization presenting social engineering as medical science and, worse, representing this as the belief of all pediatricians."

For those in pediatrics interested in this new pro-life, pro-family organization, you may visit their web site at www.acpeds.org.

RU 486 Kills Another Woman
This time it was an 18-year-old young lady, Holly Patterson, who died in California several days after taking the two pills. She is the third woman to die as a result of having an abortion by the RU 486 abortion pill. One of the other deaths in Canada was also due to an overwhelming infection resultant from the abortion. The other earlier death was from an undiagnosed tubal pregnancy that ruptured.

She had gone to a Planned Parenthood killing center and had been given the RU 486 pills. Three days later, as instructed, she took the Cytotec pills (mifeprestone). She developed severe cramping and went to a hospital. Given painkillers, she was sent home. Three more days later, bleeding and in severe pain, she returned to the hospital. She died a few hours later from septic shock caused by fragments of the fetal baby left inside her womb.

Planned Parenthood Founder, Margaret Sanger
Her Plan for Peace was published in the Birth Control Review (p. 107-108), April 1932. One of her recommendations was "To take an inventory of the secondary group, such as illiterates, paupers, unemployables, criminals, prostitutes and dope-fiends, classify them in special departments under government medical protection and segregate them on farms and open spaces as long as necessary for the strengthening and development of moral conduct." This was only a few years before Hitler took her up on this and established policies in essence adopting her recommendations.

2002 Census-U. S. Birthrate Drops
In the year 2002 there were 4,019,380 babies born in the United States. This was only 6,000 less than the previous year. But because the total population has risen, this has edged the mean fertility rate down. This is the number of babies that the average woman needs to have in her lifetime in order for the nation to replace its own numbers. That rate had been 2.1, which was replacement. It is now closer to 2.0, which is under replacement birth level. This drop was primarily due to a drop in pregnancies among teenagers, which fell 5% from last year and is now 28% lower than it was in 1990. Birthrate for women in their early twenties fell 3%. It was stable for those in their late twenties and increased a bit among women 35 and older.

India Fewer Females
It has been common knowledge worldwide that there has been a significant drop in the percentage of girls being born in India, as compared to boys. This is due to the fact that boys are more highly valued, but also due to the ruinously high dowries that must be paid by parents when their daughter marries. The availability of sex selection abortion has aggravated this. So far, nothing new. But now Deputy Prime Minister Lal Krishna Advani has said that the aggressive two child campaign and "India's obsession with having sons" has led to the number of girls going down. The 2001 census shows 933 girls born for every 1,000 boys, but here is the new information. "Activists say in poorer states such as Rajasthan in the west and Bihar in the east, the ratio is around 600 girls to 1000 boys." In comparison, globally the ratio is 1005 female to 1000 males.

NGO Status for Priests for Life
Priests for Life has just been granted non-governmental organization (NGO) status at the United Nations. This permits the activist group to be present at UN meetings and to lobby delegates, providing them with pro-life information. Only a few years ago, the only pro-life NGO at the UN was the International Right to Life Federation. Now at least six or more significant organizations have also obtained NGO status. Thanks for the reinforcements! [Note: Dr. Willke is president of the International Right to Life Federation.]

Illinois Body Piercing
In the U.S. State of Illinois, its Senate Bill 1658, passed in 2002, requires parental consent for minors to have their tongue or lips pierced. Pro-abortion forces supported this parental consent bill. These same forces, however, vigorously have opposed any parental consent for minors to have an abortion. The Supreme Court has required a judicial by-pass on laws that have mandated parental notification or consent for abortion, but none was required by this Illinois law.

Planned Parenthood Kills Babies
In 1977, Planned Parenthood Federation of America killed 55,000 pre-born babies in the United States. In 1981, it was 75,000, in 1986, 90,000. In 1991, it was 130,00, in 1996, 155,000 and in 2001, 213,000.

The Abortionist
Dr. Bernard Nathanson, now a friend, once ran the world's largest abortion clinic. In his recent book he describes those who worked with him. "They were, in a word, deplorable, consisting of an extraordinary variety of drunks, druggies, sadists, sexual molesters, incompetents, and medical losers". He also said, "As I look across the years separating me from that revolting extravaganza, playing itself out on the bodies of pregnant women and their slaughtered babies, I'm struck by the uncritical nature of the task we had set for ourselves; by the moral and spiritual vacuum at the core of this fantastic operation and by our unquestioned certainty of the high level of moral rectitude on which we operated. And yet the thing was so obviously sordid. Why couldn't we make the link between the ethical and the moral; between the shoddy practices and shoddy practitioners; the evident greed and callous motives; between the crassness of the enterprise and those involved in it; between all these ethical indicators and the grotesque immorality of the act itself".
Well friends, in many parts of the country, nothing has changed.

Words From Mother Theresa
"People are often unreasonable, irrational and self-centered; forgive them anyway. If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives; be kind anyway. If you are successful, you will win some unfaithful friends and some genuine enemies; succeed anyway. If you are honest and sincere, people may deceive you; be honest and sincere anyway. What you spend years creating, others could destroy overnight; create anyway. If you find serenity and happiness, some may be jealous; be happy anyway. The good you do today will often be forgotten; do good anyway. Give the best you have, and it may never be enough; give your best anyway. In the final analysis, it is between you and God; it was never between you and them anyway."

Breast Cancer Plus Pregnancy Equals Safe
According to the August 11 online issue of the journal Cancer, research done at the Fred Hutchison Cancer Center in Seattle examined women with breast cancer who became pregnant. They found that women who delivered at least ten months after a diagnosis of breast cancer were 46% less likely to die than women who did not have subsequent births. This should be reassuring to young women with breast cancer who would like to have another child. Clearly, if this proves to be true, a pregnancy would be beneficial rather than harmful.

Pregnant In Spite of Contraceptives
The May issue of the Journal of Human Reproduction reports on a study from the Hopital de Bicetre, in France, of almost 3,000 women age 18 to 34. Among those who became pregnant, 65% were using contraception. Of the 65%, 24% were using pills, 9% IUDs, 12% condoms and 23% other methods. Many women described forgetting a pill, a slipped condom, etc., to explain their pregnancy. What the study did, however, was confirm that in actual practice, the "theoretical effectiveness" is one thing, but the "actual" effectiveness, in practice, is quite another story. Why don't family planning agencies admit to these failure rates?

Birthrates in the West
Considerable publicity continues to tell the world of the shockingly low replacement birthrate in Europe. Ireland now has dropped below replacement level, leaving Malta the only European country above the needed 2.1 babies per woman per year. Canada, Japan and Australia are below replacement. The exception remains the United States. It was at 2.1, now it's closer to 2.0 births. But when you factor immigration in, the United States continues to grow in population.

Hybrid Humans?
Scientists in China have used cloning techniques to create a human-rabbit embryo hybrid. They created over 100 of them by fusing human skin with rabbit eggs. After several days, they killed them all in order to get what they presumed were embryonic stem cells. Previously, attempts in Massachusetts to create a hybrid human-cow had failed.

Overweight Mom Equals More Birth Defects
A U.S. Center for Disease Control study was recently published in the May Journal of Pediatrics. They interviewed the mothers of over 600 infants with birth defects, and mothers of over 300 infants born without birth defects. Women with a body mass index between 25 and 30 were considered overweight, whereas those between 18 and 25 were considered to be of normal weight. According to the study, overweight women were twice as likely to give birth to infants with heart defects, as compared to normal weight women. They were twice as likely to give birth to an infant with multiple defects. They were three times as likely to have infants with Omphalocele. The study also confirmed a previously proven link between obesity and neuro tube defects such as Spina Bifida. They did not give a cause for the link except to suggest that some of these women may have had, nutritionally, an insufficient amount of folic acid or early diabetes.

Three Cloned Pigs Have Dropped Dead From Heart Attacks
This has come to be known as Adult Clone Sudden Death Syndrome. The journal Nature has an online science update section. It notes, "The pig's demise is a stark reminder that cloned animals are far from normal. Their deaths call into question the idea of transplanting hearts or livers from cloned pigs into human.

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