Next Generation of Students Learns Life Leadership Skills at Conference

French March for Life in Streets of Paris on Anniversary (19Jan1975) of Legalized Abortion

Weitz Company in CO Continues to be Monitored for Pro-Abortion Activity

West Coast Walk for Life Sees Record 25,000 Pro-Life People Participate

Choose Life Car License Plates Now Available in 17 States

Kansas Gov Appoints New Attorney General

France Best, US Worst in Preventable Death Rankings

Should a Murderer Be Allowed to Practice Medicine?

Midas, Ecke Poinsettias are Newly Identified Corporate Supporters of the Abortion Industry

Uncompromising Amendment Passed by TN Senate

British Health Service May Pay Women £15,000 to Have Someone Else's Child

Abortionist Inflicts Psycho-terror on Pro-life Protestors in Vienna

After Successfully Avoiding Abortion, Northern Ireland Launches "40 Days for Life"

FDA Requiring Suicide Studies in Drug Trials

NEW! Planned Parenthood in Arizona sees pro-life vigils at 12 locations

NEW! Small Claims Case Against Tiller Reveals Suspicion Of Evidence Tampering

NEW! Judge Testifies Planned Parenthood Records Were Falsified, Says Abortion Business Should Not Have Been Cleared

NEW! Texas Criminal Court Again Upholds Conviction Under Unborn Victims Law

NEW! Aurora Pro-Life Advocates Sue City Over Planned Parenthood Abortion Business

NEW! Top Level MA Official and Homosexual Activist Charged with Sexual Battery of Young Teen

NEW! Abortion Moratorium: Using the United Nations Against Itself...

NEXT GEN LEARNS ABOUT PRO-LIFE LEADERSHIP. The next generation of college students received top-rate training for combating abortion and educating and equipping the leaders of tomorrow. More than 800 pro-life students attended the Students for Life of America conference in Washington, D.C. on 20Jan08, and learned from pro-life advocates on the front lines.

Students for Life, formerly known as American Collegians for Life, has undergone a dramatic makeover in recent years as new leaders have focused on building the grassroots.

Once considered a stale organization facing a lack of cohesion as student leaders changed from year to year, the reinvigorated group now has more than 400 chapters on college campuses across the nation.

The new organizational development approach has paid dividends as the group held the largest annual conference in Students for Life's 21-year history. "SFLA's conference is a vibrant experience. I always leave recharged and ready to find pro-life, pro-woman solutions on my campus," says Danielle Huntley, a Boston College Law student.

Along with providing training and networking opportunities for students, the conference showcased groups such as Feminists for Life, Concerned Women of America, the National Black Pro-Life Union, & the Family Research Council.

Kansas district attorney Phill Kline accepted this year's Defender of Life award and spoke at the banquet. Kline is a respected pro-life advocate in Kansas who has filed 107 charges against an Overland Park Planned Parenthood for allegedly illegal late-term abortions and falsifying medical paperwork.

FRC president Tony Perkins commented on the involvement of younger Americans at the conference and the March for Life on Tuesday.

"Although the young people at today's march were not born when Roe v. Wade was handed down, to quote one teenager, they are all 'survivors' of it," he explained.

He said today's college students "have grown up in an abortion-on-demand society and witnessed the devastation it inflicts on women, the family, and millions of their peers whom they will never have the opportunity to meet." Related: Students for Life of America - http://www.studentsforlife.org [23Jan08, Ertelt, LifeNews.com, DC]


FRENCH MARCH FOR LIFE IN STREETS OF PARIS. Up to 10,000 people marched in Paris last Sunday, January 19th, in protest of the anniversary of the legalization of abortion (same date in 1975). While police estimated that only 2,500 people showed up for the march, organizers claimed that around 10,000 attended. Substantial underestimation of the actual size of crowds at pro-life events seems to be the rule for police and media in most of the Western world.
The Paris March for Life began in the Plaza of the Republic and ended next to the National Opera in the middle of the city. The event was attended not only by French citizens but by Britons, Germans, Italians, and Austrians, as well as people of other countries.
The slogan of the march was "Thirty Years is Enough". Participants also held signs that read "Abortion Never Again", "Mama, Save Me, Let Me Live", and "The Family: the Foundation of the Nation".
The French news blog Christian Journal noted that the march was remarkable because in France, "the debate over abortion is almost prohibited."
One French politician, Bruno Gollnisch of the National Front, reportedly told the blog e-deo during the march that, "It's a moral issue, but it's also an issue of national importance, because France is in the process of committing suicide." He added that "If the French kill their children and cause others to come in and replace them, they forfeit their right to live freely and independently in the land of their ancestors."
France has suffered a steep decline in its birthrate, which is below replacement level, and an aging population. Increasingly, however, the country is making efforts to encourage larger families, and the birthrate has risen somewhat (see previous LifeSiteNews coverage at http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2006/mar/06033002.html), 22Jan08, M.C. Hoffman, Paris, LifeSiteNews.com]


WEITZ COMPANY BEING MONITORED FOR PRO-ABORTION ACTIVITY.  Pro-life groups in Colorado are continuing to monitor the Weitz Company, an Iowa-based construction firm that is leading the building of a massive new Planned Parenthood abortion center in Denver. Despite continued protests, Weitz officials have yet to back down from participating in the project. A new pro-life group called the Collaborators Project is watching Weitz and other companies working on the new abortion business. The group has given Weitz a firm deadline of January 31, 2008, to stop constructing the abortion facility or it will step up the protests and other boycott efforts. "If Weitz does not cease from constructing this abortion facility by January 31st, we will designate their firm with Permanent Collaborator Status,” Collaborators Project founder Will Duffy told LifeNews.com. Colorado pro-life advocates met with Weitz officials back in October and they hoped to persuade the firm to boycott the project and refuse to build the abortion center, but found considerable resistance. [22Jan08, Denver, CO LifeNews.com]
 

WEST COAST WALK FOR LIFE HAD 25,000 PARTICIPATE. A record 25,000 pro-life people participated in the annual West Coast Walk for Life over the weekend. The event is a way for residents of western states to be able to demonstrate their pro-life values without having to make the trip to across the country to Washington for the annual March for Life.

The event also focuses on more modern presentations of the pro-life message to the more liberal populations on the Left Coast. Walkers paraded down thee streets of San Francisco after hearing from Alveda King, the niece of Martin Luther King, Jr., and Gianna Jessen, a woman who survived an abortion, at a pre-walk rally. Only about 250 pro-abortion protesters showed up to hurl insults and wave their banners in the faces of those attending the walk.

"I was aborted and did not die," Jessen told the crowd. Instead, "the abortionist signed my birth certificate." King compared the pro-life movement with the struggle her family endured for civil rights for African Americans. "My uncle said injustice anywhere is injustice everywhere," King said. [21Jan08, San Francisco, CA, LifeNews.com]

Thousands March Against Abortion in S.F. Thousands of abortion protesters marched along San Francisco's waterfront Saturday, hectored by a smaller band of abortion rights supporters, as both sides marked the impending anniversary of the Supreme Court decision that established those rights 35 years ago.
 
Although passions ran high in both camps, the event - what is becoming an annual trek by the anti-abortion movement into what they consider the heart of abortion rights territory - was peaceful.
 
At least 10,000 abortion opponents were bused into the city from all over California, and from outside the state, for a morning rally in Justin Herman Plaza.
 
The two-mile Walk for Life West Coast was organized to coincide with the forthcoming anniversary of the Roe vs. Wade decision legalizing abortion in the United States.
 
Mark Bradford, 50, said he flew from Philadelphia to march for his 6-year-old son who has Down syndrome. "Every day I see the joy that my son brings to me and to my family," Bradford said. "It's distressing to me to think that under some circumstances that beautiful life would not be brought into the world."
 
The event was also promoted as a part of the Martin Luther King Jr. Day celebration and featured several black leaders, including Alveda King, a niece of the slain civil rights leader.
 
"Some women may say that we are trying to take their civil rights," King said. "But I had two abortions and one miscarriage, and I know that the civil right does not belong to me to take a life of another human being."
 
Another speaker, Gianna Jesse, who was delivered alive during a saline abortion, overcame cerebral palsy to become a marathon runner despite doctors' predictions that she was going to die, she said.
 
"I bear the mark of someone else's decision," said Jesse, who walks with a limp.
 
Greg Sprigg of Reno marched with his 14-year-old daughter, Natalie. "She will get a good sense of morality and understand what our culture of death is all about," he said.
 
The protesters said they wanted no confrontation with the abortion rights activists who spread themselves along the street chanting, "If you don't like abortion, don't have one."
 
Said Tessa Gallagher, 17, of Menlo Park, an anti-abortion marcher, "I don't think we should be hating each other because of the different opinions."
 
Tamia Thedford, a young African American woman who came to protest the protest against abortion, said she thought it curious that the overwhelmingly white crowd of abortion opponents was invoking the name of Martin Luther King Jr. "If abortion is criminalized," she said, "I think the majority of women who are going to suffer are African American women and Latinos who don't have the money to travel from state to state to find services."
 
During the march, the anti-abortion contingent sang hymns and recited prayers while they stared indifferently at their hecklers. Their critics - more than 300 strong - countered with chants and slogans and waved hand-painted posters declaring, "Keep your rosaries off our ovaries!"
 
In front of Pier 3, Katy Young, a second-year law student at the University of San Francisco, watched the throngs of disciplined abortion opponents filing by. "This is what we are up against. We live in a bubble here. All these people are going to vote Republican," she said. "I kind of feel sorry for them."
 
Krista Henneman, her schoolmate at the Jesuit school, said she was shocked by all the children marching against abortion with their parents. "Give them five years, and see how many of them are still out there," she said.
 
As the procession of protesters and their hecklers wound into Fisherman's Wharf, tourists looked up from their Dungeness crab in perplexity. Wilma and Al Anthony, from Vale, a farming town in western Oregon, took the scene in as another only-in-San Francisco novelty. "We come from a very small town. I've never seen anything like this, except on television," Wilma said. [20January 2008, San Francisco Chronicle, page B-1, Anastasia Ustinova,Sabin Russell; www.prolifeamerica.com, 21Jan08]
 


CHOOSE LIFE CAR LICENSE PLATES NOW AVAILABLE IN 17 STATES, and 11 other states are in various stages sor getting the plates. To view a map of progress, visit http://www.choose-life.org/states.htm. Funds from the license plates provided needed money for pregnancy and adoption centers.



KS GOV APPOINTS NEW AG. Gov. Sebelius has appointed a new state attorney general to replace outgoing pro-abortion attorney Paul Morrison. Morrison is leaving after the end of the month following a sex scandal with a subordinate and allegations that he asked her to interfere in an investigation of a Planned Parenthood abortion center. Sebelius, who backs abortion, named Douglas County District Judge Stephen Six to replace Morrison. Six became a district court judge in 2005 and his father, Fred Six, is a retired Kansas Supreme Court justice. "He has answered the call of public service again, and is ready to lead the people's law firm effectively, responsibly, with character and integrity," Sebelius said of her appointee. Six hasn't taken a very public position on abortion, but the statewide pro-life group Kansans for Life tells LifeNews.com Six has a history of donating to pro-abortion candidates. KFL director Mary Kay Culp said Six ha donated $750 to Sebelius campaigns and also donated to pro-abortion Congressional candidate Dennis Moore. [19Jan08, KS, LifeNews.com]


FRANCE BEST, U.S. WORST IN PREVENTABLE DEATH RANKINGS. Such deaths accounted for 23 percent of overall deaths in men and 32 percent of deaths in women, the researchers said.
 
illustrative photo France, Japan and Australia rated best and the United States worst in new rankings focusing on preventable deaths due to treatable conditions in 19 leading industrialized nations, researchers said on Tuesday.
 
If the U.S. health care system performed as well as those of those top three countries, there would be 101,000 fewer deaths in the United States per year, according to researchers writing in the journal Health Affairs.
 
Researchers Ellen Nolte and Martin McKee of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine tracked deaths that they deemed could have been prevented by access to timely and effective health care, and ranked nations on how they did.
 
They called such deaths an important way to gauge the performance of a country's health care system.
 
Nolte said the large number of Americans who lack any type of health insurance -- about 47 million people in a country of about 300 million, according to U.S. government estimates -- probably was a key factor in the poor showing of the United States compared to other industrialized nations in the study.
 
"I wouldn't say it (the last-place ranking) is a condemnation, because I think health care in the U.S. is pretty good if you have access. But if you don't, I think that's the main problem, isn't it?" Nolte said in a telephone interview.
 
In establishing their rankings, the researchers considered deaths before age 75 from numerous causes, including heart disease, stroke, certain cancers, diabetes, certain bacterial infections and complications of common surgical procedures.
 
Such deaths accounted for 23 percent of overall deaths in men and 32 percent of deaths in women, the researchers said.
 
France did best -- with 64.8 deaths deemed preventable by timely and effective health care per 100,000 people, in the study period of 2002 and 2003. Japan had 71.2 and Australia had 71.3 such deaths per 100,000 people. The United States had 109.7 such deaths per 100,000 people, the researchers said.
 
After the top three, Spain was fourth best, followed in order by Italy, Canada, Norway, the Netherlands, Sweden, Greece, Austria, Germany, Finland, New Zealand, Denmark, Britain, Ireland and Portugal, with the United States last.
 
The researchers compared these rankings with rankings for the same 19 countries covering the period of 1997 and 1998. France and Japan also were first and second in those rankings, while the United States was 15th, meaning it fell four places in the latest rankings.
 
All the countries made progress in reducing preventable deaths from these earlier rankings, the researchers said. These types of deaths dropped by an average of 16 percent for the nations in the study, but the U.S. decline was only 4 percent.
 
The research was backed by the Commonwealth Fund, a private New York-based health policy foundation.
 
"It is startling to see the U.S. falling even farther behind on this crucial indicator of health system performance," Commonwealth Fund Senior Vice President Cathy Schoen said.
 
"The fact that other countries are reducing these preventable deaths more rapidly, yet spending far less, indicates that policy, goals and efforts to improve health systems make a difference," Schoen added in a statement. [http://www.javno.com/en/world/clanak.php?id=112382, Reuters ]
 
 


SHOULD A MURDERER BE ALLOWED TO PRACTICE MEDICINE? The case of a Nazi sympathizer who entered a famed Swedish medical school in 2007, seven years after being convicted of a hate murder, throws a rarely discussed question into sharp focus: Should a murderer ever be allowed to practice medicine?

A killer turned healer might seem to be a shining example of prison rehabilitation. And in many societies, including the United States, criminals who pursue an education during or after their prison sentence are often admired for their determination to turn their lives around.

Yet it is hard to think of a case in which a murderer should become a medical doctor. Murder and medical practice are simply incompatible. Medical education involves more than learning from textbooks. Earning a medical degree requires a student to interview and examine patients, often in intimate circumstances.

Integrity and trust are the core of the patient-doctor relationship. Any erosion of them could harm the healing process.

How many patients would feel comfortable being put to sleep by an anesthesiologist who once murdered?

Most medical institutions do not want murderers in their midst.

How many patients would go to a hospital where a doctor was a convicted murderer?

How many doctors and nurses would feel comfortable on the same team as a murderer, particularly a perpetrator of a hate crime against one’s own group?

The Swedish case is extraordinary, of course. But it poses questions that resonate far beyond the prestigious Karolinska Institute, where the murderer, Karl Helge Hampus Svensson, 31, began medical school last year. (Last week, he was expelled on a technical issue — apparently falsifying his high school transcript.)

Alliances like the European Union have made it easier for doctors licensed in one country to practice in another. This increases the pressure on medical schools to be ever more vigilant in asking applicants about past criminal activity.

Potential terrorists, for example, might find a medical license useful. In the Middle East, doctors have been leaders of terrorist groups, and just last July, British officials implicated four doctors and three other medical workers in botched terrorist attacks in London and Glasgow.

Mr. Svensson (he had legally changed his surname from Hellekant while in prison) was convicted in the 1999 hate murder of a trade union worker and was paroled after serving six and a half years of an 11-year sentence. The Karolinska learned of his identity through two anonymous tips last fall. Although many Swedish news organizations reported the story at the time, most adhered to local journalistic custom and did not name him.

In scores of interviews, Swedes tended to express the view that a convicted criminal who wanted to go to medical school deserved the opportunity.

But their opinions changed when they were informed that the Karolinska student was the publicized 1999 murderer. Although a few of those interviewed said they might go to such a doctor depending on circumstances, none said they would send a loved one.

Swedish law prohibits public universities like the Karolinska from asking about an applicant’s criminal past. But taxi companies and other private concerns are allowed to demand such information before hiring an individual.

What makes murder a special problem for medicine is the lengthy, costly and complex education system.

Consider the application process, which can vary among medical schools, even in the same country.

The Karolinska does not require letters of recommendation, as is usually standard in the United States. About one-third of the Karolinska students are admitted on the basis of grades without an interview. The other two-thirds are judged on grades and an interview with senior faculty members. Applicants choose whether they want to be interviewed, and Mr. Svensson was one of them.

Two faculty members, one a psychiatrist, interviewed Mr. Svensson separately. But neither asked for an explanation of the six-and-a-half-year period in his life, when he took courses through a prison-based intranet system. He did not volunteer his prison record. Karolinska faculty interviewers are not required to keep notes of those encounters.

No one knows how many Swedish doctors have criminal records, in part because of Swedish laws and culture that emphasize personal integrity. When Mr. Svensson’s classmates were asked at a student meeting how many had criminal records, nine other men and women said they did, according to an article in the medical student union’s publication, Medicor. No definition of what constituted a crime was given.

In the United States, the chances of a convicted criminal’s being admitted to medical school were reduced in 2002, when the standard application form from the Association of American Medical Colleges began requiring answers to questions about military discharge history, arrests and felony convictions.

Eight of the 126 medical schools in the United States do not participate in the association’s application service but may solicit the background information on their own. Six of the eight are in Texas. The 118 others may choose to receive only some of the solicited information, depending on state laws and institutional policies on privacy rights.

Each school determines which offenses, if any, would disqualify an individual for admission.

The association also recommends that all medical schools conduct criminal background checks for all matriculating students. But it is not clear how many do. From 2002 to 2006, on average, 26 of 36,000 applicants a year said yes to a felony.

Dr. Harriet Wallberg-Henriksson, the Karolinska’s president, has asked the institute’s ethics committee to address a number of questions concerning long-range policy on the issue of admitting criminals to the medical school.

Among the questions: Must educators and administrators inform patients about a convicted criminal student’s past? If so, when and how? What about a convicted murderer who was later involved in treating a patient who died under medical care? Even if he was innocent in that death, the suspicions would be hard to erase.

Before Mr. Svensson was expelled, the Swedish medical licensing agency said that even if he graduated it would not permit him to practice. Sweden does not give medical licenses valid for only certain categories, like research.

As the Karolinska Institute struggled with the legal, administrative and ethical quandaries in the Svensson case, Dr. Wallberg-Henriksson was asked whether she would go to a doctor who had murdered. She would not say. But never, she added in one of a series of interviews in her office, would she send her children to such a doctor.

Speaking of the general problems in admitting a murderer to medical school, Dr. Wallberg-Henriksson said: “In the final analysis, it comes down to trust, because when you are a patient you are putting your life in someone else’s hands.”

Last week, she said that because Mr. Svensson’s expulsion was based on a technicality, his case did not resolve the broad issue of who is fit to be a doctor and whether a murderer forfeits the right to become one. That, she repeated, is up to Swedish legislators and government officials, who have given her mixed messages so far.

And if government officials make a legal exception for murder, they face another question: Where to draw the line for other criminal acts?

Lawrence K. Altman, M.D., reported from Stockholm last month and later added updated information. Majsan Bostrom contributed reporting from Stockholm. [29Jan08, The Doctor's World, Lawrence K. Altman, M.D., Stockholm,
www.nytimes.com/2008/01/29/health/views/29docs.html?ref=science&pagewanted=print]




MIDAS, ECKE POINSETTIAS AMONG NEWLY IDENTIFIED PP CORPORATE SUPPORTERS. First-Time Corporations on The Boycott List: BBJ Linen (home products), Carlson Companies (travel agencies, hotels [Country Inns & Suites, Park Inn, Park Plaza, Radisson, and Regent], and restaurants [T.G.I. Friday's and Pick Up Stix]), FastSigns (graphics/printing), InterContinental Hotels (Candlewood, Crowne Plaza, Holiday Inn, Indigo, InterContinental, and Staybridge), Midas (motor vehicle care), and Paul Ecke Ranch (poinsettias), among others.
Continuing PP Supporters: AlphaGraphics, Basics Office Products, Wachovia, Nike, Time Warner (Cinemax, HBO, AOL, etc.), Bank of America, the Dallas Cowboys, CIGNA, Walt Disney, Johnson & Johnson, Lost Arrow (Patagonia, etc.), Chevron, Wells Fargo, Whole Foods Market, and Nationwide (insurance), etc.
"Dishonorable Mention" section of charitable groups associated with Planned Parenthood and/or its agenda: includes Amnesty Int’l, American Cancer Society, Camp Fire, Girls Inc., Girl Scouts, Human Rights Watch, Kiwanis Clubs, Doctors Without Borders, the March of Dimes, the Muscular Dystrophy Association, Rotary Clubs, the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation, and the YWCA, among others. “The Pro-Life Movement will succeed only to the extent that pro-life people are willing to be inconvenienced," Scott said. "The very lives of children are worth that much -- and a whole lot more." [3Jan08 LifeSiteNews.com]


UNCOMPROMISING PRO-LIFE AMENDMENT PASSED BY TENNESSEE SENATE 23-9. If the Tennessee House passes the state constitutional amendment, a state Supreme Court ruling in 2000 asserting that abortion is a protected right would become void. The amendment states: "Nothing in this Constitution secures or protects a right to abortion or requires the funding of an abortion. The people retain the right through their elected state representatives and state senators to enact, amend, or repeal statutes regarding abortion, including circumstances of pregnancy resulting from rape or incest or when necessary to save the life of the mother." This measure has passed in the Senate three times, but has not yet passed in the House. [Lifesite.com, 1-31-08; EF News & Notes, 1Feb08]


BRITISH HEALTH SERVICE MAY PAY WOMEN TO HAVE ANOTHER'S CHILD. While the House of Lords continues to debate the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill, the National Health Service (NHS) is considering paying women to carry children to term for someone else, including for homosexual partners.

The Daily Mail reports that the North East Essex Primary Care Trust has discussed the possibility of paying for couples to have IVF services, including expenses for surrogacy.

A report presented to the Trust directors said, "It appears that the majority of applications for surrogacy to be funded on the NHS stem from heterosexual couples, but consideration would need to be taken for any homosexual couple or single person who wished to become a parent through surrogacy."

"There are more extreme scenarios to consider, such as the husband or parents of a dead woman applying for surrogacy to provide a baby using the dead woman's embryo."

Paul Tully, general secretary of the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children, spoke to LifeSiteNews.com about the practice of surrogacy, saying it is simply "part and parcel" of the commodification of the human embryo in the entire project of artificial reproduction.

Tully said that while SPUC had not yet developed a specific policy on the practice, "we would be broadly critical," in the same terms with which they criticise artificial reproductive services in general. "The whole human process is going in the Brave New World direction," he said.

"The embryo becomes a product," he said, "as if those who are pursuing the new reproductive technologies are looking for different ways of using their new product." Pending further information, the Trust plans to render a decision next month. [1Feb08, Hilary White
London, LifeSiteNews.com]

VIENNA ABORTIONIST INFLICTS TERROR ON PRO-LIFE PEOPLE. Austrian pro-life demonstrators outside the abortion business of Austrian abortionist, Fiala, are now enduring his latest infliction of psychological terror from paid abortion escorts, who have in the past abused and assaulted both physically and sexually the peaceful protestors.

Video footage from Gloria TV shows Fiala's goons trying to intimidate the demonstrators outside his business with an intense form of psychoterror and hatred aping the demonic. The video records the clinic escorts contorting their faces into snarls, howling like wolves, grunting heavily, uttering screams and wailing moans, chanting fiercely, breaking into hyena-like laughs and heaping other such psychological abuse in an unnatural manner for human beings.

The psychological abuse occurs regularly with the full consent of Fiala, who has two video cameras that monitor the events that occur outside his Gynmed walk-in abortion business in the heart of Vienna. Fiala has accused pro-life demonstrators outside his clinics of "psychoterror," while in fact his paid "escorts" sexually abuse male and female protestors under his supervision.

Gloria TV also reports that Vienna's police has tacitly approved the violence against the law-abiding pro-life protesters by refusing consistently to take any action. The Socialist controlled government in Vienna is also considering legislation to ban all pro-life activists from the public property outside abortion clinics, even if they are only praying silently.

The most notorious and well-known abortionist in Austria, Dr. Christian Fiala has made his life's work the advancement of abortion in Austria and Europe. He is the chairman of the International Association of Abortion and Contraception Specialists and directs the well-known Gynmed abortion clinics in Vienna and Salzburg. Fiala's brainchild, the Museum of Abortion and Contraception opened in Vienna in March 2007, and catalogues a history of human effort through the ages devoted to suppressing or destroying the next generation of human life in the womb.

See the video posted by Gloria TV (CAUTION: FRIGHTENING OR DISTURBING CONTENT http://en.gloria.tv/?video=gyqb763ew2mlxybjeaex)

Related coverage: CAUGHT ON VIDEO: Abortion Clinic Escorts Sexually Abuse Praying Pro-Life Activists http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2007/nov/07113002.html

Museum of Abortion and Contraception Makes Debut in Austria
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2007/mar/07031905.html
[25Jan08, P. J. Smith, Vienna, LifeSiteNews.com]



SUCCESSFULLY AVOIDING ABORTION, NORTHERN IRELAND LAUNCHES '40 DAYS FOR LIFE' STARTING 6 FEB. Two months ago Northern Ireland's pro-life movement won a victory in turning back an attempt to have abortion legalized 'through the back door'. Now Precious Life is launching "40 Days for Life", the startlingly successful campaign of spiritual and pro-life witness which began in the United States in 2004.

When the Department of Health of the Government in Westminster drew up draft guidelines on abortion, Precious Life held a series of meetings with MPs and Northern Ireland Assembly Members warning them that guidelines would change how the law against abortion is interpreted and effectively legalise abortion in Northern Ireland 'through the back door.' In September, a motion was tabled in the Northern Ireland Assembly, opposing the Department of Health guidelines.

Before the debate, Precious Life made a presentation of 120,000 petitions against abortion, signed by the Northern Ireland public.

Bernadette Smyth, Director of Precious Life, described the overwhelming passage of the motion as "a victory for unborn children."

Now Precious Life is promoting a campaign of 40 days of prayer and fasting for an end to abortion, which will run from February 6th to March 16th. The campaign consists of three components - prayer and fasting; peaceful vigils outside abortion agencies; and community outreach. Precious Life says they hope the 40 day campaign will inspire people who have never been involved in pro-life activities to come forward and join the pro-life movement.

The group has already started to distribute thousands of campaign leaflets together with a petition postcard to the Northern Ireland Office to keep abortion out of Northern Ireland.

Smyth commented: [Starting 6 February] "...communities across Ireland and the UK will be uniting with more than 50 cities in the USA for the largest simultaneous pro-life mobilisation in history - The 40 Days for Life Campaign...for the defeat of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology (HFE) Bill which goes before the House of Commons in February. The HFE Bill ...fundamentally undermines the dignity and sanctity of human life by allowing human beings to be created and destroyed at will for experimentation. Although the Bill itself does not deal with abortion, it is expected that the pro-abortion MPs will table amendments to liberalise the law on abortion and extend it to Northern Ireland."  [25 Jan 2008,  John-Henry Westen, Belfast, LifeSiteNews.com]





FDA NOW REQUIRING SUICIDE STUDIES IN DRUG TRIALS. After decades of inattention to the possible psychiatric side effects of experimental medicines, the Food and Drug Administration is now requiring drug makers to study closely whether patients become suicidal during clinical trials.

The new rules represent one of the most profound changes of the past 16 years to regulations governing drug development. But since the F.D.A.’s oversight of experimental medicines is done in secret, the agency’s shift has not been announced publicly.

The drug industry, however, is keenly aware of the change. Makers of drugs to treat obesity, urinary incontinence, epilepsy, smoking cessation, depression and many other conditions are being asked for the first time by the drug agency to put a comprehensive suicide assessment into their clinical trials.

In recent months, the agency has sent letters — it would not say how many — to drug makers requiring that they use such a scale. Merck, Sanofi-Aventis and Eli Lilly are all using a detailed suicide assessment in clinical trials being conducted now.

The seeds for the new federal effort were planted four years ago with the discovery that antidepressants may cause some children and teenagers to become suicidal. Top agency officials at first discounted the finding but commissioned researchers from Columbia University’s department of psychiatry, led by Kelly L. Posner, to reanalyze the drugs’ clinical trials. This work caused the drug agency and its experts to view the risk as real.

Then it received an application for rimonabant, a much-heralded obesity drug developed by the French drug giant, Sanofi-Aventis. As agency medical reviewers pored over the drug’s clinical trial data, they discovered hints that it could cause psychiatric problems, too.

Unsettled by their experience with antidepressants, agency reviewers again mandated the use of Dr. Posner’s system. The assessment found that the drug doubled the risks of suicidal symptoms. In June, an F.D.A. advisory committee voted unanimously that the agency reject rimonabant because of its psychiatric effects, and Sanofi-Aventis withdrew the application although the drug is sold in Europe.

Just this month, the results of a trial of Merck’s obesity drug, taranabant, were published showing similar psychiatric problems. Meanwhile, fears have grown that drugs used to treat epilepsy, seizures and mood disorders may have similar effects. An extensive examination of these medicines by the drug agency should be completed this year.

Suddenly, agency officials realized that multiple classes of medicines might cause dangerous psychiatric problems.

“Clearly we were somewhat surprised when this signal emerged in the pediatric antidepressant data,” said Dr. Thomas P. Laughren, director of the drug agency’s division of psychiatry products. “So various groups within F.D.A. are now looking at suicidality more broadly as a possible adverse event.”

The drug agency’s concerns are consistent with a growing body of research confirming that behavior is heavily influenced not only by genes but also by seemingly innocuous changes in body chemistry. Drugs not reaching the brain were once thought to be largely free of mental effects.

“One lesson from pharmacology is that you can see effects on emotion and cognition without the drug entering the brain if a drug leads to peripheral changes in” other chemicals that enter the brain, said Dr. Thomas R. Insel, director of the National Institute of Mental Health.

Some critics say that the agency’s new-found focus on psychiatric side effects is long overdue.

“The list of drugs that causes psychiatric problems is a very long one,” said Dr. Sidney M. Wolfe, director of Public Citizen’s health research group.

Medicines to treat acne, hypertension, high cholesterol, swelling, heartburn, pain, bacterial infections and insomnia can all cause psychiatric problems, effects that were discovered in most cases after the drugs were approved and used in millions of patients.

Some drugs cause depression so often that doctors prescribe antidepressants prophylactically with them.

Among medicines still for sale, the F.D.A. has determined that the drugs’ benefits outweigh their psychiatric risks. Still, the agency now wants to uncover such problems more reliably and before approval.

There are two reasons that the F.D.A. for years was inattentive to the psychiatric effects of new medicines. First, distinguishing between mental problems that spring from a disease and those that result from its treatment is often difficult. For antidepressants, many researchers suggested that suicidal behaviors resulted because, as patients’ depression lifted, they suddenly had the energy to carry out previous suicidal thoughts.

Second, drug side effects are often first identified in clinical trials when multiple doctors treating hundreds of patients record similar problems in trial notes. But terms to describe depression or suicidal thoughts can vary widely, making them hard to discern.

“The whole spectrum of suicidal thoughts, ideation and attempts is much more difficult to define and study than” other drug problems, said Dr. Eric Colman, deputy director of the drug agency’s division of metabolic and endocrine products.

Indeed, the agency’s initial review of the effects of antidepressants in children was plagued by inconsistent and erroneous observations by investigators. A 10-year-old boy who tried to hang himself was listed only as having a “personality disorder,” an overdose of 11 tablets was called a “medication error” and a girl who slapped herself in the face was labeled as having attempted suicide.

Dr. Posner’s team spent months reclassifying these events as either a suicidal symptom or not. The team created a detailed questionnaire called the Columbia Suicide Severity Rating Scale, now adopted by the drug agency as an often mandatory test to be used in clinical trials.

The last time one medicine’s side effect led the F.D.A. to broadly re-examine its drug approval process was in 1992, when it discovered that Seldane, a popular antihistamine, could cause dangerous heart arrhythmias. Tests revealed other drugs that could affect heart rhythms, and the agency soon mandated that nearly all experimental medicines be tested for heart rhythm effects.

Unlike the Seldane example, however, not every experimental drug program must use the new suicidal symptoms scale. Drug officials said that they looked at a drug’s molecular structure and its effects in animals before deciding whether to insist on the new test.

“That’s where it gets tricky,” said Dr. Colman. “It’s difficult to say where you draw the line.”

But Dr. Posner said in an interview that so many companies and academic research programs were adopting the suicide questionnaire that she was having trouble keeping up with the demand for its use. The questionnaire has been translated into 80 languages, and Dr. Posner has trained scores of teams of investigators from around the world on how to use it. On Jan. 4 she lectured a group of investigators at Yale.

Benjamin A. Toll, an assistant professor in the university’s department of psychiatry, was in the audience and said he planned to use the Columbia questionnaire in a trial almost immediately.

“It’s much more detailed than what we were doing before,” Dr. Toll said. “We used to ask, ‘Are you feeling down? Are you feeling sad?’ ”

Dr. Colman said that the new questionnaire, while important, would not end the uncertainty around suicidal symptoms.

“If a drug makes people depressed but doesn’t make them suicidal, what do you conclude?” he asked. “There will always be some degree of uncertainty.” [24Jan08, G. Harris,
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/24/washington/24fda.html?ref=us&pagewanted=print]

PP IN ARIZONA SEES PRO-LIFE VIGILS AT 12 LOCATIONS. Today starts the national 40 Days for Life campaign. With the national leader, David Bereit, and all the participants at the local level, these pro-lifers are striving to save lives and hold prayerful vigils throughout these 40 days. This spring campaign will end on March 16, 2008.

At least 35 of the 59 official prayer vigils are being held outside Planned Parenthood facilities. To find these locations, visit the ALL.org Map Room and click on the state you are looking for.

"We thank pro-lifers in Arizona for covering 12 of the 20 Planned Parenthood locations in that state during these 40 days." [STOPP, WSR, 6Feb08, ALL; www.40daysforlife.com]

SMALL CLAIMS CASE AGAINST TILLER REVEALS SUSPICION OF EVIDENCE TAMPERING. During a hearing today in Small Claims Court, Judge Stephen K. Woodring heard concerns raised by plaintiff Mark Gietzen that security video footage taken of a hit-and-run incident outside the Women’s Health Care Services abortion clinic had been tampered with.

Gietzen is suing abortionist George Tiller for injuring him when Tiller rammed his armored Jeep Grand Cherokee into Gietzen during an incident in 2006. In an effort to settle the case, Geitzen had asked to preview the security tape recorded by WHCS security cameras, which the judge ordered to be played at the time of trial, if a settlement could not be reached.

Geitzen and Operation Rescue spokesperson Cheryl Sullenger viewed the evidence that was produced by Tiller security guard John Rayburn. Instead of a video, which Rayburn earlier indicated did exist, Geitzen and Sullenger were shown a series of bitmap photographs.

Attorney Scott Sanders, who was hired by Tiller’s insurance carrier to negotiate a settlement, told Gietzen and Sullenger that the security camera did not record video, but instead snapped photos in 3 second intervals. However, the photographs shown were not in 3-second intervals, but in varying intervals from 1 second to 13 seconds between pictures.

Three different photographs were marked with identical time stamps down to the second. According to what Sanders told Geitzen and Sullenger, it would be impossible for the camera to take 3 images all within the one-second time frame. Attorneys offered no explanation for the discrepancy.

“I have no doubt in my mind that the time stamps on those images had been altered and that images in the sequence were missing,” said Sullenger. “This raises serious questions about the integrity of any evidence produced by Tiller.”

During the hearing, Tiller did not appear, but was represented instead by Sanders, Dan Monnet, and Laura Shanneyfelt. However, in small claims court, each party is required to appear on their own behalf and not have the representation of an attorney.

The judge indicated that Sanders, Monnet, and Shanneyfelt were not “representing” Tiller but were there only for “informational purposes.”

“You can twist the language all day long, but the fact is that three attorneys represented Tiller’s interests against a single private citizen during that hearing,” said Sullenger. “It seemed grossly unfair. Tiller is continuously afforded special priveleges that others do not receive, even down to special security measures that were insitituted for this hearing.”
The small claims trial has been continued until March 20. [5Feb08, Wichita, KS; Life Dynamics]


JUDGE TESTIFIES PP RECORDS WERE FALSIFIED, SAYS ABORTION BUSINESS SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN CLEARED: Evidence supports allegations of collusion between abortion clinic and Attorney General Morrison

Olathe, KS – Shawnee County District Court Judge Richard D. Anderson testified in a Johnson County court on Wednesday that he believed that medical records supplied to him by Planned Parenthood had been altered. Anderson further testified that he sought the opinion of a police handwriting expert, who confirmed his suspicions that information regarding the gestational age of pregnancies had been tampered with.

Gestational age is a vital aspect of accusations that Planned Parenthood committed illegal abortions since Kansas law prohibits abortions after 22 weeks when the baby is viable.

“Judge Anderson’s testimony is powerful confirmation that Planned Parenthood falsified medical records in order to avoid criminal prosecution. This is a felony in anyone’s universe, and those responsible belong behind bars,” said Operation Rescue President Troy Newman.

Anderson had originally received the abortion records in 2004 in response to an investigation conducted by former Attorney General Phill Kline into illegal late-term abortions. The Kansas Supreme Court ordered that identifying information be redacted from the records before they could be supplied to Kline.

When Anderson received the records back in 2006, he noticed the falsifications.

Those altered records were later allegedly reviewed by Kline’s successor, Paul Morrison, who issued a letter in June, 2007, exonerating Planned Parenthood of any wrongdoing. At that time Operation Rescue questioned the honesty of Morrison’s actions and alleged that he was covering up for abortion employees’ criminal conduct.

Anderson testified that he thought that is was wrong of Morrison to have issued that letter.

Morrison recently tendered his resignation after admitting to an extra-marital affair with a subordinate and allegations that he attempted to use that relationship to help him illegally influence abortion investigations of Planned Parenthood and late-term abortionist George R. Tiller of Wichita. Those allegations cast serious doubt on the integrity of Morrison’s determinations, and support allegations of collusion between Morrison and Planned Parenthood.

Kline, now the District Attorney of Johnson County, filed 107 criminal charges against Planned Parenthood, including 23 felony counts, in October, 2007. Judge Anderson’s testimony was presented at a hearing asking for the removal of two Planned Parenthood attorneys who delivered the altered records to Anderson. Judge Stephen Tatum, who heard Anderson’s testimony, ruled the attorneys could continue to represent Planned Parenthood since it could not be proved that knew the records had been altered.

“Planned Parenthood has been caught lying and Morrison has been caught covering up for them, but what we have heard in the media today is more about Planned Parenthood’s whininess about this prosecution being a witch hunt. That rhetoric seems more absurd than ever now that they’ve been caught red-handed,” said Newman. “We pray that the corrupt abortionists and their lackeys will be speedily brought to justice.” [January 17th, 2008, Olathe, KS; Life Dynamics]

TX CRIMINAL COURT AGAIN UPHOLDS CONVICTION UNDER THE UNBORN VICTIMS LAW. For the second time, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals upheld a double murder conviction of a man who killed a pregnant women's unborn children. The decision further validates the constitutionality of the state's unborn victims law, which pro-life advocates fought for to give justice to women and unborn children. The state's Prenatal Protection Act authorizes prosecutors to charge attackers with two crimes instead of one when both mother and baby are attacked and killed or injured. The case before the court involved a man who beat his pregnant girlfriend in order to kill a set of twins neither of them wanted. Erica Basoria lost her unborn sons after she asked her boyfriend, Gerardo Flores, to step on her stomach. Flores was convicted of two counts of murder in the case but Basoria was not punished and authorities said the law was unconstitutional under equal protection considerations since she asked him to kill the babies. Prosecutors told the court that evidence showed Basoria was abused and did not make the request of Flores to kill the children. The appeals court sided in favor of the law contending that the repeated stomping on Basoria's stomach could not have been consensual and that Flores' attorneys raised the equal protection claim well into the case rather than in the original trial. [14Feb08, Austin, TX LifeNews.com]


AURORA PRO-LIFE ADVOCATES SUE CITY OVER PLANNED PARENTHOOD ABORTION BUSINESS. Pro-life advocates in Aurora, Illinois have filed suit against city officials for voting to dismiss motions they filed to reverse permit decisions allowing the building of a new Planned Parenthood abortion business. The Aurora Zoning Appeals Board voted unanimously to dismiss the motions last month. City officials disagreed with their contention that the approval of the building permit for Planned Parenthood's abortion center violated zoning rules. The zoning board dismissed the case saying the appeal didn't fall within its jurisdiction. The board also claimed the appeal wasn't filed in time. A group of citizens teamed up with a local pro-life group for a lawsuit filed for them by the Thomas More Society, a pro-life law firm. Planned Parenthood, the City of Aurora, Illinois and the Aurora Zoning Board are named in the suit and accused of depriving the families of their right as citizens to voice their concerns about the impact of the abortion business. The suit contends Planned Parenthood used a fictitious name, the Gemini Office Development corporation, to hide its identity during the zoning approval process. [14Feb08, Aurora, IL (LifeNews.com]


TOP LEVEL MA OFFICIAL & HOMOSEXUAL ACTIVIST CHARGED WITH SEXUAL BATTERY OF YOUNG TEEN. Carl Stanley McGee, 38, a top-level aide in the administration of Massachusetts governor Deval Patrick has been charged with sexually assaulting a 12-15 year old boy. The incident occurred in late December, but has only been made public in the past several days.

McGee allegedly assaulted the boy at a resort on the Gulf Coast in Florida, the prestigious Gasparilla Inn & Club. The day after meeting the boy at the resort and exchanging a few words with him, McGee allegedly entered the steam room where the boy was sitting, removed the boy's towel, massaged his shoulders, and performed [sexual acts] on him. The victim subsequently told his father about the incident, who then reported McGee to the police. McGee was arrested, held overnight and released on $300,000 bond.

According to reports McGee, whose makes approximately $115,000/year, has been put on unpaid leave, and still officially retains his position, pending trial. He is scheduled to be arraigned in Lee County, Florida next week.

McGee is the assistant secretary of policy and planning in the Massachusetts Executive Office of Housing and Economic Development. Besides being one of the leading figures in the push for homosexual marriage in Massachusetts, he has also reportedly been instrumental in the drafting of Governor Patrick's life science legislation. Patrick's life science efforts seek, amongst various other things, to overturn former governor Mitt Romney's prohibition on embryonic stem cell research, and to pour millions of dollars into the unethical research.

McGee has been heavily involved in the organization MassEquality, the primary mission of which is to introduce same-sex "marriage" into Massachusetts. MassEquality also states on its website that the organization is working hard to export same-sex "marriage" to nearby New England states. "MassEquality is joining forces with Gay & Lesbian Advocates and Defenders (GLAD) and state-wide organizations to secure marriage equality in every New England state within the next five years," says MassEquality's website. "It's time that Massachusetts no longer be the only state in the nation with true equality in marriage."

McGee and his homosexual partner were listed as "patrons" at the 2007 MassEquality gala dinner, second only to "founders", having donated at least $2500 to the organization. The former Rhodes Scholar and Harvard Law school graduate also served as the director of the civic and business outreach efforts of MassEquality, according to the Boston Globe.

The 38-year-old homosexual activist made headlines in 2005 when he contracted a high-profile homosexual "marriage" with his partner, Rev. John H. Finley [Episcopal priest]. A New York Post piece reported on the event and the homosexual couple's relationship at some length.

Two days after being arrested for sexual battery, McGee was pulled over for speeding, and given a $181 fine. He is scheduled to appear in traffic court on Feb. 13. [13Feb08, Boston, MA, John Jalsevac, LifeSiteNews.com] 

 

ABORTION MORATORIUM: USING THE UNITED NATIONS AGAINST ITSELF. Call for abortion moratorium has met astounding and favorable public response from nations as diverse as Spain and IndiaHot-button pro-life and pro-family issues have the power to define politicians and their campaigns. Yet the campaign debates on pro-life matters have centered largely on domestic policy. Now, in a strange twist of events at the global level, politicians may find themselves pressured to answer an international demand for a worldwide moratorium on abortion. 
Just a month old, the call for an abortion moratorium has already met an astounding and favorable public response from nations as diverse as Spain and India. Advocates report that the moratorium has persuasive force with people of all backgrounds. "It is a human matter, yes? Not only for people of religious faith," said Lola Velarde, president of the European Network Institute for Family Policies in Spain.
 
The moratorium arose as an unexpected response to a United Nations' resolution calling on its member states to submit to a voluntary moratorium on the death penalty. The resolution, a "landmark step" passed in December, justified its call for the moratorium because the death penalty "undermines human dignity." Furthermore, the resolution states, the moratorium contributes to a "progressive development of human rights."
 
Support for the UN's death penalty moratorium included the Holy See Mission to the UN. The delegation's statement read, in part,
 
"In welcoming the adoption of this draft resolution, the Holy See once again calls on all States to take a consistent view on the right to life, in a way that their support for this important draft resolution would equally mean their support for the protection of the life of the unborn."
 
UN delegates and staffers are used to ignoring the Holy See's call for a "consistent ethic of life" in dealing with humanitarian issues, it being an open secret that the UN uses these agencies to aggressively promote abortion. So it perhaps came as a surprise even to the Holy See when a secular Italian journalist, Giuliano Ferrara, founder and director of the opinion newspaper il Foglio, used the opportunity to call for an abortion moratorium as well.
 
Ferrara, once a leader in the Italian Communist Party, appeared on television the day after the resolution on the death penalty passed, arguing that the logic of the death penalty being "unjust" and an offense against "human dignity" leads to the logical defense of innocent life in the womb...
 
Politically, a moratorium is an inspired vehicle for peaceful change.

Because the UN's death penalty moratorium is strictly voluntary (the resolution being non-binding), compliance is achieved by pressure from within the international community. In a similar manner, the abortion moratorium does not call for overturning laws in nations where the procedure is legal. Rather, it calls on policymakers to oppose it as social policy.

Social pressure becomes political pressure.
 
Velarde points out that the moratorium is the perfect tool to raise public awareness about what abortion really is. "It is a pro-life moment for us," she said, "as we move toward our national election on March 9."

The incumbent president, José Zapetero, is "the radical pro-choice candidate," and "he does not want to address the issue of the moratorium in the platform. Before now, abortion was never mentioned in the [political] debate. But now, the topic is on the television."
 
Meanwhile, in South Korea, Rev. Casimiro Song, Secretary of the "Life 31 Movement", gave an interview to AsiaNews concerning the moratorium. "We welcome the UN adoption of the moratorium on the death penalty, passed on December 17, 2007 and we think it is a logical conclusion to extend it to a moratorium on abortion. As matter of fact, human life begins from the very moment of the conception."
 
Song continued, "To give a direct example, the number of serious criminals executed every day is only a tiny proportion compared with the thousands of innocent human lives that are silently killed by abortion every day throughout the world." He also added a call to include embryonic stem cell research in the moratorium. Other voices have quickly come on board.

The Missionaries of Charity's Sister Nirmala, Mother Teresa's successor, urged nations to support the UN's moratorium and the moratorium on abortion.

Her countryman, Lenin Raghuvanshi, an avowed atheist and human rights activist awarded the Gwangju Prize for Human Rights, concurs: "It is ridiculous and absurd to suggest that abortion is a solution to hunger, in order to control population growth. What's more the concept -- typical of UN organizations -- that overpopulation represents the greatest danger to the health of a nation has no basis at all in reality."
 
The call for a moratorium on abortion was certainly never the goal of the UN resolution on the death penalty. That resolution is scheduled as an agenda item again at the 63rd meeting of the General Assembly in 2008. Perhaps by then the logical connection between "undermining human dignity" via the death penalty and abortion will become more apparent -- even for global politicians.
Mary Jo Anderson is a contributing correspondent for www.WorldNetDaily.com;
[5 February 2008, Mary Jo Anderson; LifeSiteNews.com]