Op-ed: ‘Targeting the womb, Down syndrome, disabilities’
July 7th, 2008From Newsday:
Valerie Karr, a Columbia University PhD candidate studying international perspectives on disability rights, raises an alarm about what she calls the “virtual extermination” of children with Down syndrome and the tendency of society to devalue those with disabilities.
She examines the influence of persisting negative views among physicians and society on the 92 per cent abortion rate of fetuses with Down syndrome, and says increased prenatal screening will mean that “the world will miss out on the opportunity to experience these wonderful and giving members of our society.’
Nor is this “profound and disturbing” question limited to Down syndrome, Karr writes. Recent research seems to indicate that autism could represent “the next wave in disability-related abortion.”
Such abortions raise painful questions normally relegated to the religious or philosophical spheres. Do we want only “perfect” children? Does society value “normal” people more than those with disabilities? Is the unalienable equality inherent in all humans a fraud?
… We have resolved in the courts, for the time being, the issue of abortion. It remains a woman’s choice. But that choice is demeaned if communities devalue the life of its disabled. The vast majority of these children are handicapped in the womb, condemned by their disability to disposable status despite the fact that children like Sully can live long, happy lives that enrich everyone they touch. Awareness of the equality of all children — including children with disabilities — is the first step to legitimizing a woman’s right to true choice and to the broader acceptance in society for the rights of persons with disabilities.
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