National Uniform Abortion Laws - Radio Interview Transcript

The Australian Medical Association is calling for national uniform laws on abortion so that all Australian women have equal and safe access to the treatment.

The AMA's spokesman on obstetrics, Dr Andrew Pesce, says the States and Territories should clarify their legislation, and he wants the Federal Government to play a part in reforming the laws.

The call comes as a doctor in New South Wales is being prosecuted for providing a late term abortion. Lyn Bell reports.

LYN BELL:

Abortion laws are complex and different in each State and Territory, and they're again coming under close scrutiny.

In Sydney, Dr Suman Sood has been charged with manslaughter after providing an abortion to a woman who was five-and-a-half months pregnant. She's the first doctor to be prosecuted for the manslaughter of a foetus since 1971.

In Victoria, Senator Julian McGauran wants the Medical Practitioners Board to investigate an abortion carried out when another woman was eight months pregnant.

The Australian Medical Association's spokesman for obstetricians and gynaecologists, Dr Andrew Pesce, says uniform national laws on abortion would remove some of the uncertainty about the procedure.

ANDREW PESCE:

I think it's important for doctors and patients to have a fairly clear and consistent set of rules that can be applied for them to understand what is lawful in this country and what isn't lawful.

LYN BELL:

Dr Justin Oakley is the Director of the Centre for Human Bioethics at Monash University, and he agrees a national consensus is required.

JUSTIN OAKLEY:

Yes, I would certainly support that call. It seems to me that it leaves women and abortion providers in the dark to have these variable restrictions on access to abortion.

LYN BELL:

The AMA's Dr Pesce says any decision on abortion should only be made by a doctor and a patient.

ANDREW PESCE:

I think doctors are uncomfortable with the notion that they should be making moral choices, either on behalf of their patients or for society, and I suppose that's part of the reason why we're looking for whatever boundaries it seems that the public wants to set in this area, then doctors and women need to know.

LYN BELL:

So do you think it's up to the Federal Government to play a leading role, then, in instigating one set of national laws?

ANDREW PESCE:

It's going to be one of these situations where the Federal Government probably needs to play a role in coordinating discussions possibly, but all of the State jurisdictions have to come along.

LYNN BELL:

The Health Minister in New South Wales is willing to look closely at the AMA's proposal. But Dr Justin Oakley from Monash University goes further and says abortion should be decriminalised, as it is in the ACT.

JUSTIN OAKLEY:

Well, I do think that there is increasing moral complexity about late term abortions, but I also think that women in some of those cases have weighty enough reasons to make those abortions ethically justifiable.

And again I think it's a question of women's reproductive autonomy, and I think it would be barbaric if women are forced to continue with a pregnancy against their will by doctors who are afraid of being prosecuted for carrying out abortions.