Christian Medical Association Doctors: Women Deserve to Know Facts on Fetal Development, Abortion Pain.

WASHINGTON -- Citing the medical principle of informed consent, the Christian Medical Association (www.cmawashington.org), the nation's largest faith-based organization of physicians, today asserted that women deserve to know the medical facts about fetal development and abortion-induced fetal pain. Such facts are key to court cases on the partial-birth abortion ban and to federal legislation that would require telling women considering an abortion after 20 weeks gestation the full facts about the pain her baby would experience.

CMA Executive Director Dr. David Stevens observed, "The medical principle of informed consent requires that patients receive a complete and candid presentation of the facts. That's why we physicians applaud Congressman Smith, Senators Brownback and Alexander and other leaders who have helped introduce the Unborn Child Pain Awareness Act. Women simply deserve to know all the facts before making a decision."

Dr. Stevens added, "The medical evidence shows that a partial-birth abortion inflicts cruel and horrific pain on a conscious baby. Yet the arguments of abortionists in these cases reveal deep callousness and a determination to keep the facts from their patients."

Stevens cited testimony taken from the March 31 transcript of opening arguments by plaintiffs in National Abortion Federation v. Ashcroft in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.

"A doctor called by abortion groups testified that the pain he is causing a baby during an abortion never crosses his mind. I can assure you that this question crosses the mind of many of the women under his knife. This case has revealed what abortionists and abortion rights lobbyists have tried so hard to hide from women - that abortion stops a beating heart in the most painful, gruesome manner imaginable. It's time the truth be told."

Dr. Gene Rudd, an obstetrician-gynecologist and CMA Associate Executive Director, said, "Court and congressional testimony by experts including Dr. Jean Wright indicates that sensory perception appears on the face of the human fetus in the seventh week of development, and over their entire body by the 20th week. Studies reveal that newborns not only feel pain; they react to pain with three to five times more sensitivity than adults."

Dr. Rudd added, "Medical science since Roe v Wade in 1973 and new technology such as '4-D' ultrasound and in-utero surgery are yielding new light on the miracle and wonder within the womb. These technologies and facts on fetal pain are helping more women to realize that the life they hold within them is wonderful and precious."

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