Archives: Cocke to investigate late abortions

Vancouver Sun, May 11, 1974

By Karin Moser

Health Minister Dennis Cocke will launch a personal investigation into reports that some B.C. Hospitals have aborted fetuses more than five months old.

In a telephone interview from Victoria, Cocke said Friday he would look into the case of a baby girl aborted at Vancouver General Hospital several months ago.

A confidential record of the case obtained by the Vancouver Sun indicates the baby was born alive but lived only 24 hours.

The mother had been aborted because she was "distraught" about being over 40 and pregnant.

The baby weighed nearly 2 1/2 pounds, "a weight," said one gynecologist, not affiliated with the hospital, "comparable to a six- or seven-month old fetus."

Cocke said he was under the impression that all hospitals performing abortions were staying within the maximum 12 to 14-week limit.

"I really wasn't aware that so many hospitals are carrying out abortions on 20-week-old fetuses."

Section 251 of the Criminal Code permits abortions only when a hospital committee determines that continuation of pregnancy "would or would not be likely to endanger her (the mother's) life or her health."

At Richmond General Hospital, a fetus more than five months old was aborted two months ago, according to hospital administrator Hugh Ross.

Ross said the abortion committee really "clamped down after that one and we're not doing any abortions now over the 16-week period."

"That baby died because of the saline solution used in the abortion procedure," he said.

He said the board decided then that there is no really valid reason for performing an abortion at such a late date and fetuses at five or more months would not be aborted.

Richmond General carries out 300 abortions a year.

Surrey Ald. Bonnie Schrenk said, in an interview, she learned of an abortion "of a five-month-old fetus" at Burnaby General within the past 12 months.

"That baby lived four hours after the abortion," she said.

Dr. Harold Zimmerman head of the hospital's medical advisory committee, said he is unfamiliar with such a case, but he added that he has held the position only since "the beginning of this year and I don't really know what went on before that."

He stressed that doctors at Burnaby General are "leaning over backwards" not to go over the five-month limit and, if possible, not over 16 weeks.

"What we get, though, are women coming back two or three times and actually using abortion as a form of contraception. This is terrible and some of our doctors are now refusing to do a second abortion.

"One doctor told a patient recently that he'd do the first one and that's the chance he was giving her but her wouldn't do a second one for her."

Dr. Chapin Key, executive director at VGH, expressed shock when informed of the case at his hospital.

He said a quick investigation appeared to indicate the doctor miscalculated the age of the fetus and believed it be in the neighborhood of 18 weeks instead of 21 weeks at which its abortion was reported.

"This is the first case of an infant being born aborted over five months of age in all the 10,000 abortions we've carried out in the last three years," he said.

"But I can't stress enough that women should begin assuming some responsibility for their own bodies and actions so that doctors won't be confronted with this steady stream of late, unwanted pregnancies."

A check of some other Lower Mainland hospitals indicated that hospital administrators knew little, if anything, of abortion policies in their institutions.

At Lions Gate Hospital, Dr. John Bragg admitted he "didn't know" the cut- off limit for abortions.

"I really haven't looked into our policies on abortions for the last two or three years," he said.

Dr. Jim Corbett, the hospital's recently-appointed medical co-ordinator said abortions are rarely performed at Lions' Gate over 14 weeks.

"We're pretty careful about that and most of the abortions are done at 10 to 12 weeks."

In rare instances, he said, they are being conducted on a four-month old fetus.

Surrey Memorial Hospital administrator Margaret Woodward, confessed that "hospital policy doesn't really spell out a cut-off date for aborting fetuses."

"But to the best of my knowledge doctors in this hospital are not carrying out any abortions beyond 19 weeks."

Asked if she could say how many abortions had been performed there in the past year, Mrs. Woodward said she did not have the figures readily available.

"Furthermore, our board is very reluctant to release such figures because they next thing you know, people are comparing, saying that maybe we're doing more than Royal Columbian so it must be easier to get an abortion here and then our doctors are besieged with requests."

"Quite frankly our doctors simply aren't that anxious to perform abortions."

New Westminister Coroner Doug Jack, said he has put "the clamps" on late abortions following an incident "four years ago in which a baby of 24 weeks (six months) was aborted, put in a pan and left to expire there.

"I keep a really close eye on the abortion situation at Royal Columbian," he said "and I can assure you there is no way a fetus over five months is being aborted.

"Most of the abortions are performed at eight or ten weeks."

Evidence is accumulating in B.C., other provinces and throughout the world, that more abortions are being made readily available at later dates and for less valid medical reasons than ever before.

The recently-produced Foulkes report on the future of health care of British Columbians calls for increased abortion facilities and pressure on the federal government to remove abortion from the Criminal Code.

Last year, a United Community Services study revealed that more than 8,000 abortions were performed in B.C. hospitals.

Some of the women had had one or two previous abortions and refused after each procedure to employ proper means of contraception.