Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1382687
3 LETTERS & EDITORIAL maltatoday | SUNDAY • 13 JUNE 2021 Mikiel Galea Letters & Clarifications Abortion destroys unborn IN her article (MaltaToday, 2 May 2021) Prof. Isabel Stabile says that "it is sufficient for laws that criminalise abortion and risk women imprison- ment, to be repealed." So for her the real reason for the decriminalisation of abortion is for women not to go to prison. How self- ish. She is unfazed by the fact that by abortion, whether legal or not, women are deliberately killing their unborn children. Who cares! She further added: "It also makes me angry; angry at a system that seems to care more about the views of those who have never been pregnant, never had to live through this, some of whom are not even women." Again she is angry but not because during a pregnancy, in the process of doing an abortion, so many unborn children are tortured and killed indis- criminately. Then she calls herself a doctor, and a gynaecologist to boot. "Never had to live through this" – this, meaning pregnancy. How utterly in- sensitive, how disgustingly demeaning, what an insult to motherhood. She also says: "The absence of a local family planning clinic is sorely felt." Then she deliberately failed to mention the sterling services now being given to women with difficult pregnancies by Dar Tgħanniqa t'Omm of the Mal- ta Life Network Foundation or Dar Gużeppa Debono in Gozo. She also says that "she is the only openly pro-choice gynaecologist on this island." That's because she has no respect for the dignity of unborn children. Other motives, who knows what they might be, must be propelling her to be so openly and so vociferously pro-abortion. So many other gynae- cologists protect, not kill, unborn chil- dren and deliver them to their loving expectant mothers and fathers, as their profession requires of them. Malta is proud of these gynaecologists. The picture in the US, however, is not so much pro-choice as hardened pro-choicers, like Stabile, try to make it look. I have read many times that half of American women are pro-life. Not only, they love and cherish their unborn children. Besides, recent statistics have a story to tell about the situation in the USA despite the pressure President Biden is now mounting to enlarge abortion facilities in the USA. The Guttmacher Institute lately released a policy analy- sis highlighting the significant legisla- tive progress that pro-lifers have made at US state level in 2021. The report in- dicates that 536 pro-life laws have been introduced this year. More important- ly, 61 pieces of pro-life legislation have been signed into law and 13 states have enacted at least one pro-life law. Montana passed legislation protect- ing preborn children after 20 weeks' gestation. Furthermore, eight gesta- tional age limits have already been enacted. The Guttmacher Institute states that the number of pro-life laws enacted during the past four months is "unprecedented". Guttmacher also noted that 28 pro- life bills were signed into law. High- lights from the year included Idaho and Oklahoma, each passing bills that protect preborn children after a foetal heartbeat can be detected. Additionally Arizona governor Doug Ducey signed a bill prohibiting abor- tions due to a prenatal diagnosis such as Down syndrome. Also, in response to the recent Food and Drugs Admin- istration decision allowing women to obtain chemical abortion drugs by mail during the pandemic (Stabile's pet subject in Malta) Montana, Indiana, and Arizona all enacted safeguards on chemical abortions. The Guttmacher Institute is a pro- choice research organization started in 1968 that works to study, educate, and advance sexual and reproductive health and rights. It used to form part of Planned Parenthood, the largest abortion factory in the USA. But it split from Planned Parenthood in 2007. So it's not a church organisation at all. The above breaks the myth that Malta is the only country with 'harsh' pro-life legislation. Tony Mifsud, Coordinator, Malta Unborn Child Platform Clarification: Corinthia report A report on the financial figures for 2020 for IHI plc, the owner and oper- ator of the Corinthia brand of hotels, published in the print edition of Malt- aToday on Sunday of 6 June, 2021 car- ried a factually wrong assertion about the sale of a 50% stake in Golden Sands Resort Limited to IHI plc. Specifically, the report erroneously referred to that stake as belonging to the Zahra family (the founders of the Island Hotels Group) which had sold its share of Golden Sands to IHI in 2015. The sale referred in the 2020 financial report of IHI, that of Bezem- er Limited to IHI for €13 millin, had nothing to do with the Zahra family. The correct report appears online at https://bit.ly/350xp5t The error is regretted and we extend our sincere apologies to the Zahra family for any inconvenience caused.