Monday, May 29, 2006

Religion News Service/Washington Post Examines Prevalence of Sex-Selective Abortion in India

Religion News Service/Washington Post / Kaisernetwork.org
The Religion News Service/Washington Post on Saturday examined the prevalence of sex-selective abortion in India despite laws forbidding the practice (Samson Katz, Religion News Service/Washington Post, 5/20). India in 1994 approved the Prenatal Determination Act, which bans the use of technologies such as ultrasounds and sonograms for the purpose of sex-selective abortion. The law also bans advertisements for prenatal sex determination, as well as the practice of preconception sex selection law (Kaiser Daily Women's Health Policy Report, 5/15). Despite the law, some advocates say the desire for male heirs has produced a need for ultrasound clinics that can determine the sex of a fetus and has created medical practices that profit mostly from performing sex-selective abortions. According to the Religion News Service/Post, some experts have estimated that some physicians charge between $80 and $230 for an ultrasound and an abortion and "still act with impunity" in relation to sex-selective abortion. "But attitudes are changing" in some Indian communities, including the village of Kajampur, where equal numbers of girls and boys have been born "for several years," the Religion News Service/Post reports (Religion News Service/Washington Post, 5/20).

The Religion News Service/Washington Post on Saturday examined the prevalence of sex-selective abortion in India despite laws forbidding the practice (Samson Katz, Religion News Service/Washington Post, 5/20). India in 1994 approved the Prenatal Determination Act, which bans the use of technologies such as ultrasounds and sonograms for the purpose of sex-selective abortion. The law also bans advertisements for prenatal sex determination, as well as the practice of preconception sex selection law (Kaiser Daily Women's Health Policy Report, 5/15). Despite the law, some advocates say the desire for male heirs has produced a need for ultrasound clinics that can determine the sex of a fetus and has created medical practices that profit mostly from performing sex-selective abortions. According to the Religion News Service/Post, some experts have estimated that some physicians charge between $80 and $230 for an ultrasound and an abortion and 'still act with impunity' in relation to sex-selective abortion. 'But attitudes are changing' in some Indian communities, including the village of Kajampur, where equal numbers of girls and boys have been born 'for several years,' the Religion News Service/Post reports (Religion News Service/Washington Post, 5/20)."

Sunday, May 28, 2006

Early Conduct Problems and Later Life Opportunities

J Child Psychol & Psychiat
"Associations between the extent of conduct problems at age 8 years and later life opportunity outcomes at age 18 years were examined in a birth cohort of New Zealand children studied prospectively to age 18 years. Conduct problems at age 8 were assessed using a combination of parent and teacher reports of conduct disordered and oppositional behaviours. Two measures of life opportunities were assessed at age 18: (a) whether the young person had left school by age 18 without educational qualifications; (b) whether the young person had experienced a period of unemployment of 3 months or longer following school leaving.

The analysis suggested the following conclusions: (1) There were clear and significant (p< .0001) tendencies for increasing levels of conduct problems at age 8 to be associated with increasing risks of leaving school without qualifications and of unemployment by age 18. (2) A substantial component of these associations was explained by a series of confounding social, family, and individual factors (notably child intelligence, early attentional problems, and family sociodemographic disadvantage) that were associated with both early conduct problems and later life opportunities. (3) Further analysis suggested that linkages between early conduct problems and later educational underattainment and unemployment (after adjustment for confounders) were mediated by a series of adolescent behavioural processes including patterns of peer affiliations, substance use, truancy, and problems with school authority."

Friday, May 26, 2006

Internal Hospital Memo Provides Evidence of Sex-Selective Abortion in Canada

www.lifesite.net
Western Standard magazine, one of the few conservative publications in Canada, has acquired an internal document from Women's Hospital in Vancouver which shows that abortions are carried out at taxpayer expense when the reason is merely that the parents are not satisfied with the sex of the child. The cover story of the June issue of the magazine, which is arriving in mailboxes this week and is set to hit newsstands next week, reports moreover that similar to countries where sex-selective abortions are rampant, the birth ratio in certain communities in Canada with large Indian and Chinese populations is becoming increasingly skewed against girls.
...

Wednesday, May 17, 2006

Can the Seamless Garment be Sewn? The Future of Pro-Life Progressivism

www.stthomas.edu
Pro-Life Progressivism and the Fourth Option in American Public Life
Thomas C. Berg.

Prophetic Politics: A New Option
Reverand Jim Wallis

Panel: Prospectives on Pro-Life Progressivism

The Consistent Life Ethic: A Look Around, A Look Ahead
John L. Carr

The Consistent Life Ethic
Sidney Callahan

Unraveling the "Seamless Garment"
Susan Frelich Appleton

Another Social Justice Tradition: Catholic Conservatives
Kevin E. Schmiesing

The Consistent Ethic of Life: A Proposal for Improving its Legislative Grasp
Helen M. Alvare'

Sacred Monkeys and Seamless Garments: Catholics and Political Engagement
John P. O'Callaghan

Can the Seamless Garment be Sewn? The Future of Pro-Life Progressivism
Kevin Doyle

The Coherence and Importance of Pro-Life Progressivism
Mark A. Sargent

American Catholics and the Structure of Life Attitudes
Ted G. Jelen

Faith and Values in the Public Arena: An American Catholic in Public Life
James L. Oberstar, M.C.

Monday, May 15, 2006

In India, Gender Is a Life-and-Death Issue

Newhouse A1
``All girls' parents must pay dowries," Radhika says. "We will take loans and pay it back bit by bit. It might take up to a year's time."

Though dowries are illegal in India, the law is widely ignored and the Devis fear a third daughter will send them over the edge financially. Instead, they hope for a son to one day provide for the family. He would fetch his own dowry upon marriage, take care of his parents as they grow old (India has no social security program) and carry on the family name.

In India's male-dominated society, especially the northwest, this logic is one reason parents abort an estimated half-million female fetuses each year. The practice, called female feticide, has been responsible for at least 10 million female abortions since 1985, according to a controversial study published in January in the Lancet, the British medical journal.

``All kinds of famines, epidemics and wars are nothing compared to this," said Punit Bedi, a New Delhi gynecologist. "In some parts of India, one in every five girls is being eliminated at the fetal stage.

``It is a genocidal situation."
...

Saturday, May 06, 2006

Asociación de Víctimas del Aborto [Association of Victims of Abortion]

Asociación de Víctimas del Aborto [Association of Victims of Abortion]
Translated version of http://www.vozvictimas.org/
Medical consequences of the abortion caused in women

Abortion Victims Group Established

Abortion Victims Group Established
zenit
"The Association of Victims of Abortion has been established in Spain to protect and assist anyone who have suffered directly or indirectly from the consequences of abortion.

AVA intends to 'compensate the families victims of abortion induced or caused by medical imprudence, making their voices heard in administrative proceedings and pertinent judicial endeavors,' the group said in a statement. "

Risk Determinants of Suicide Attempts Among Adolescents (Abstract)

Am J Economics & Sociology
"Abstract. In this article we present evidence about the factors that determine four gradual decisions on the part of adolescents to attempt suicide. To that end, we estimate a series of binary choice models by using data drawn from the U.S. National Youth Risk Behavior Surveys corresponding to 1991, 1993, 1995, and 1997. Our results show that the decisions to attempt suicide are motivated by both demographic and psychosocial variables, such as gender, age, ethnicity, education failure, possession of a gun, habitual participation in sporting activities, individual weight perception, and taking pills or provoking vomiting to lose weight. Moreover, we also find that a significant degree of influence is exerted by another group of factors, such as the consumption of drugs, sexual relationships, and, finally, pregnancy."

Tuesday, May 02, 2006

Clinton and Reid co-author "common ground" abortion piece

SiLive.com: NewsFlash
"ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid have co-authored an op-ed piece about finding 'common ground' on the abortion issue.

The Democrats from New York and Nevada, respectively, are on opposite sides of the abortion issue. Clinton, the former first lady and potential 2008 presidential candidate, favors abortion rights while Reid is anti-abortion.

'As two senators on opposite sides of the abortion debate, we recognize that one side will not suddenly convince the other to drop its deeply held beliefs,' the two Democrats wrote in the piece that ran in Tuesday's Albany Times Union newspaper. 'And we believe that, while disagreeing, we can work together to find common ground"