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- by Lene Bang, june 16, 2025
Answer from a midwife to my questions about ethics when participating in dubious medical interventions:
Ethical questions for the Medical Association, doctors and midwives:
https://news.jfk21.dk/lists/?pi=ViewBrowserPlugin&p=view&m=692
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Dear Lene
I don't see how your questions, apart from question 1 about abortion, relate to midwives, as this is not an area that midwives deal with. So I will disregard them. I'm also not sure I understand your question about abortion. I will try to answer if you can formulate a question.
If you are asking about the ethical perspective of participating in and supporting a woman undergoing an abortion, there are very subjective attitudes towards abortion. A midwife may, for ethical reasons, choose not to participate in abortions if it conflicts with religious or ethical principles, but in that case, she has a duty to find another health professional who can assist the woman. Does that answer your question?
Kind regards
Sandra Ana Laksø
TR for midwives, Herlev and Gentofte Hospital
LMU vice-chair and VMU deputy
Midwife response 16.06.2025
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Dear Sandra
Thank you for being the only one to take the time to answer my question about whether a midwife can be forced to perform an abortion up to the 18th week, even if it goes against her conscience.
When you write that a midwife can, for ethical reasons, choose not to participate in abortions if it conflicts with religious or ethical principles, but in that case has a duty to find another health professional who can assist the woman, this is effectively coercion if no other professional can be found. The Nuremberg trials have taught us not to compromise our conscience, because we cannot relinquish our responsibility to be ethical human beings.
You are right that there are very subjective attitudes towards abortion, which is why it seems completely undemocratic to impose the 18-week limit on us without a referendum. There is also disagreement in the Ethics Council – a disagreement that is simply being ignored, with language being used as a weapon and the issue being framed as one of women's rights:
https://sundhedspolitisktidsskrift.dk/nyheder/sundhedspolitik/10155-abortgraensen-haeves-til-uge-18-en-historisk-dag-siger-sophie-lohde.html
As midwives, have you been asked and will you still perform the procedure even if politicians choose to follow the WHO's recommendation that there should be no limit at all, so that midwives can still be forced to assist in aborting fully viable foetuses?
Would you answer the following questions?
1. How should such a ‘safe’ abortion be performed on a large, healthy and fully viable child, initially up to 18 weeks, but when we have to follow the WHO's rules, right up to birth?
2. Should the child be killed while still in the womb, or should it be delivered first and then killed afterwards? Is the child anaesthetised beforehand, or is it torn apart without anaesthesia?
3. What ‘tools’ are used to kill the child? Metal, chemicals or something else?
4. How is the ‘abortion’ disposed of?
5. Is the body sold to industry for use in lotions, medicines and food products? Who are the customers?
6. How much does an aborted child's body cost?
7. Are some body parts more expensive than others?
8. Is there any guarantee that it will be killed, or can it be handed over to a third party?
9. Who gets the money?
These are some rather disturbing questions about what is really going on under the guise of women's rights to their own bodies. I think this is dumbing down women, giving the impression that they do not understand the connection between sexual intercourse and pregnancy.
Every individual should of course take responsibility for what they want to contribute to. Although the other questions are not relevant to midwives, I still hope that they have provided food for thought.
Kind regards
Lene Bang
Folkemor
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