Our depravity knows no bounds. This makes me so sad. First Things reports:
An Oregon couple is suing because a test missed that the child had Down syndrome, which had they known, would have resulted in their child’s abortion. From the story:In the months before their daughter was born in 2007, Deborah and Ariel Levy worried the baby might have Down syndrome. They say a doctor at the Legacy Center for Maternal-Fetal Medicine assured them that a sample of tissue taken from the placenta early in the pregnancy ruled out the developmental disability, despite the results of later testing that showed the fetus might have it. But within days of the birth of their daughter, the Southwest Portland couple learned the baby did have Down syndrome. Had they known, they say, they would have terminated the pregnancy. Now they’re suing in Multnomah County Circuit Court, seeking more than $14 million to cover the costs of raising her and providing education, medical care, and speech and physical therapy for their daughter, who turned 2 this month. The suit also seeks money to cover her life-long living expenses.
This is not the same thing as when a physician’s negligence injures a fetus. Seeking to have the injury causer bear the cost of caring for the child after he or she is born is a legitimate subject of litigation. But the doctor in this case didn’t injure anyone.
These “wrongful birth” lawsuits are pernicious and support the new eugenics project upon which society has embarked. Eugenic abortion may be legal, but as a matter of public policy, doctors should not be punished simply because a baby was born.
Can you imagine trying to explain this to your child when they were older? (Granted a person with Downs might not understand, but still...)
"Yeah, we wanted you dead, but since the doctor screwed up, we sued those people for all they had because you are such a burden to us."
6 comments:
It's so sad. Very revealing of the depravity into which we're all born.
I looked up "death" in the Bible Gateway. Wanted to see what there was among, say, the Canaanites and the Jews who adopted their ways too much....
But one thing early in the search results struck me was Gen 21:16. Abraham had sent off Hagar, Sarah's handmaiden with whom Abraham ... took the initiative to make good on God's promise of a son, with a skin of water and the boy into the wilderness. They ran out of water, and she just knew the boy was about to die ... "Then she went and sat down opposite him a good way off, about the distance of a bowshot, for she said, 'Let me not look on the death of the child.' And as she sat opposite him, she lifted up her voice and wept" (Gen 21:16 ESV).
"Let me not look on the death of the child" It was unbearable, as it would be for any parent, right? So where does the desire to kill a child come from? Sinful, fallen nature of man, true, but what within that gets SO messed up? -- because it's not only redeemed, Christian people who love and care for their kids!
This reminds me of a roommate that I had in college who had a rocky relationship with his parents. I remember one time he was broken and in tears as he recounted to me the time his mother said to him "I knew I should have had that abortion." That statement definitely scarred him and made him feel like it was impossible to be loved. It's a messed up world that we are so selfish and so hurtful that we view abortion as an option.
Lew
Man! So sobering! This is why the earth needs the Gospel!
I worry about the medical implications of this - the fear of litigation gives doctors even more reason to push for abortion.
The people with Down's Syndrome whom I have known could definitely understand what it means to say "I wanted you dead, but the doctor screwed up." When I lived in an apartment complex for people for disabilities in the D.C. area, my neighbor was a woman with Down's Syndrome. She would have understood the meaning of such a statement.
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