Martin Scicluna isn’t mincing his words. That was my first thought as I glanced at his article ‘Abortion: misplaced hysteria’ (October 28).
Even that, however, didn’t prepare me for the extent to which Scicluna had clearly bought in to the false notions, misconceptions and incorrect statements that have been freely bandied about in the embryo-freezing issue. Personally, I thought his choice of epithets unbecomingly self-indulgent but I was far more disappointed by the paucity of reprocessed arguments that he had to resort to in order to make his points.
Right off the bat, Scicluna weighs in with the popular canard that claims are being made that ‘embryo freezing is equivalent to abortion’. This is, of course, utterly untrue. No one within any of the pro-life movements is making this unfounded claim. The problem is, and this is where the spectre of deception raises its head, that the new legislation being proposed will unavoidably lead to the creation of embryos destined only for destruction, even as it creates others destined to enjoy the privilege of being allowed to live.
It is unbelievable that in 2015 Malta, we are still embroiled in a discussion over whether embryos are living human beings or not. No one in the world of embryology debates this any longer, any more than physicists debate whether an atom is indivisible. It is a given, an argument settled long ago, attested to by the foremost researchers in the field, undisputed by any of their peers today. Only someone living in a bubble of scientific ignorance or, worse still, consumed by a prejudice that eclipses all reason, would be capable of denying this.
Let us be clear then, IVF is not, in and of itself, abortion. Obviously not. But the way in which it will be conducted, under the newly proposed rules, will create a great number of living human embryos many, if not most, of which will eventually be aborted. Is that plain enough?
The Embryo Protection Act, as it now stands, is the fruit of intense debate between embryologists, bioethicists, legal experts and legislators.
It took 22 months to thrash out – a substantial length of time, although not the several years that Scicluna implies. It took that long to complete because it had to address, primarily, the needs of infertile couples but it had also to take into account the potentially innumerable embryos whose lives many care so little about.
It is unbelievable that we are still embroiled in a discussion over whether embryos are living human beings or not. No one in the world of embryology debates this any longer
The disingenuous quotation of an eight per cent successful pregnancy rate that Scicluna so casually dismisses as inadequate, does, admittedly, sound low at first reading but what it does not reveal is that the figure compares favourably with the success rates obtained anywhere else (for example, ‘Committee opinion of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists on oocyte vitrification’, 2014).
Most importantly, however, it was achieved with no unnecessary loss of life. This is an enormous accomplishment, testimony to the inestimable value we attribute to human life and Scicluna’s indifference to it does him no credit.
What is truly perplexing, in fact, is the sudden rush to bludgeon through a completely new set of IVF regulations that will dispense with the ethical considerations underpinning the existing rules while offering so very few additional benefits in return. Now, that is a question towards which Scicluna might usefully be encouraged to bend his mighty intellectual resources.
Furthermore, I am afraid that Scicluna’s compulsive references to former prime minister Lawrence Gonzi at this and other junctures contribute little to his argument. Perhaps they are intended only to ease the pressure of his own personal prejudices in this regard.
In a pitiful act of sophistry bordering on desperation, Scicluna proceeds to compare the natural loss of embryos, over which no human being has any control, with the deliberate destruction of human lives consequent to the creation of living embryos later deemed to have no further purpose.
The self-evident ludicrousness of this argument is breathtaking. It is exactly the same as claiming that, because huge numbers of human individuals die each day from accidents and natural causes, we are, therefore, entitled to further destroy as many more as we please.
Put another way: people die all the time, of all sorts of things, so why shouldn’t I kill off the odd few myself, from time to time, especially if it’s in a good cause?
Scicluna set the tone for his opus with the clumsy swipe of an intellectual poseur - a contemptible effort to equate Malta Life Network with Għaqda Patrijotti Maltin. I can see that shamelessly defending the indefensible must be an uphill struggle at the best of times but, really, how low is one allowed to stoop in the process?
Ivan Padovani is a member of ProLife Network.