The feminists of Women’s Center against Violence of Aosta reported on Saturday 27 April that some women, who went to public hospitals, were forced to listen to their heartbeat by some pro-life volunteers, to dissuade them from proceeding with the abortion. The controversies launched from the left were immediate and obvious, and did not subside even after the prompt denial of the Aosta Local Health Authority which declared that «there are no volunteers from private associations in the clinics or in the hospital and no report to this effect has reached the Company and the Social Policies Department neither by citizens nor by associations”.
The Minister for the Family Eugenia Roccella also intervened in the case, during the debate “Natal rate target” held within the FdI programmatic conference, “Italy changes Europe”, which is taking place in Pescara. «Making the heartbeat of the unborn child heard by a woman who is going to have an abortion is certainly not a way to help difficult maternities. It is something that should not be done, but it was certainly not a volunteer who did this because to make the heartbeat feel you need an ultrasound and a gynecologist, so it is a practice that evidently was done by some gynecologist and therefore it is right that this bad medical practice should emerge in the press.”
Roccella did well to highlight it the impossibility that a volunteer was able to make the mother listen to the heartbeat. Furthermore, the feminists’ report has all the appearance of a big hoax: coincidentally, in fact, it simultaneously targets the proposed law A beating heart and the possible inclusion of pro-life associations in counseling centers recently proposed by the government.
In this sense, Roccella was wrong to take this fact as true, attributing the choice to have the heartbeat listened to by a gynecologist. It is to be assumed that no gynecologist has carried out this action, especially because objecting doctors are expelled from the wholeprocess abortive, including diagnostic procedures.
On the rest, the Minister confirmed his position liberal on the subject of abortion and more generally on ethically sensitive issues. His attempt to scuttle the bill appears very clear A beating heart. But let’s get into more detail.
First of all, one wonders why this should be bad medical practice that of listening to the heartbeat of the fetus. There is a lot of talk about informed consent and a woman’s freedom of choice and therefore, assuming this perspective which in its radical terms is erroneous, why not make the woman aware that there is her child in her womb? Why dissuade her from holding the baby by not letting her listen to her heartbeat? Isn’t that violating her freedom by depriving her of an option? Therefore, even using the erroneous grammar of the pro-choice we would arrive at the same conclusions as the pro-lifers, who however start from the intangibility of the unborn child as a premise: it is good to listen to the heartbeat of the fetus.
And instead using a grammar typical of a healthy anthropology we could add: diverting a woman from filicide by listening to her heartbeat is an act that makes the person free; on the other hand, allowing her to do it, depriving her of this auditory stimulus, will forever make her a slave to feelings of guilt.
Secondly, this practice could very well be included, without the need for an ad hoc bill, in those diagnostic tests that a doctor, in science and conscience, could prescribe in view of an abortion. Conversely, where would the freedom of the medical profession go? This choice could easily fall within paragraph 2 of the art. 5 of 194: «When the woman turns to her trusted doctor, he carries out the necessary health checks, respecting the dignity and freedom of the woman; evaluate with the woman herself […] also based on the outcome of the above investigations, the circumstances that determine her to request the termination of the pregnancy”. First point: who decides whether certain tests are necessary? The doctor.
Second point: does listening to the heartbeat harm the dignity of women and their freedom? We have already spoken about freedom previously. It is easy to argue about dignity: only good actions are in keeping with the intimate preciousness of the person. Making the pulse heard to dissuade a woman from having an abortion is an act in keeping with the dignity of the person. Recommending abortion is contrary to this dignity.
Third point: paragraph 2 then tells us that the doctor can evaluate together with the woman and possibly to the father the reasons why he wants to have an abortion. Obviously this implies the intention to divert her from the abortion, otherwise why evaluate them if I have a woman in front of me who wants to have an abortion? Fourth point: again in paragraph 2 it is added that this evaluation aimed at giving birth to the baby can also make use of clinical investigations, therefore including listening to the heartbeat. In a nutshell, listening to the heartbeat can make a woman change her mind and this is what is indicated in paragraph 2.
On the other hand, the dissuasive purpose is present – albeit pro forma – in 194 itself. Just to quote the most explicit passage: «The family counseling centers established […] assist the pregnant woman: […] d) helping to overcome the causes that could lead a woman to terminate her pregnancy”. And can’t making the heartbeat be heard be a way to overcome the causes that lead to an abortive choice?
One could argue that the doctor can also only listen to the heartbeat, without having to let the mother listen to it. The answer is that generally the patient is always interested in knowing the results of diagnostic tests, otherwise why do them? And then it would be a proposal, not an imposition. A possibility, not a duty. Having said this, however, let us remember that already today those who ask for an abortion must proceed with certain diagnostic tests. Don’t want to do them? You cannot have an abortion, pursuant to law 194.
Yet in the face of all these arguments, Roccella had the courage to affirm: «Making the heartbeat of the unborn child heard by a woman who is going to have an abortion is certainly not a way to help difficult maternities. It is something that should not be done».
