At a glance this article is short and innocuous. The writer reports that the number of babies born with Down's Syndrome has increased between 1989 and 2006. And then it went on to puzzle over this fact, since methods used to detect Down's have improved, and the writer makes an implicit conclusion that people, conceivably and sensibly, should not "press ahead with a pregnancy" despite a positive test result.
The reasons cited for "pressing ahead" were mentioned: 20% cited that they had known somebody with Down's, 33% cited religious or anti-abortion beliefs, 30% felt life had improved for people with Down's, and almost 20% said they simply did not believe the results of the test. It was as if the article was trying to explain an inexplicable phenomenon. Not once they mentioned the fact that it is human life at stake.
It's amazing how this article managed to be callous without realizing it. "Pressing ahead", indeed!
Link here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7741411.stm
UPDATE: Check out the comments left by readers on the article.
Most are parents with a child or children with Down's Syndrome, and none of the mothers ever regret "pressing ahead" with the pregnancy! I wonder, then, just why it is those who favor eugenic abortion that seem most vocal in defense of the woman's "right". There was only one (thus far) anonymous commenter wrote that she chose to abort a baby detected with Down's out of misplaced sense of compassion—thinking that such a child would be a 'burden' to its older sibling, totally missing the point that in the families who chose to welcome the special child, life did not become burdensome but blessed and enriched instead!
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