Canada Province Should Let Doctors Do Tax-Funded Abortions, Activist Says 
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by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
June 7, 2006
Fredericton, New Brunswick (LifeNews.com) — A leading pro-abortion advocate who heads up a national trade group for abortion businesses says the Canadian province of New Brunswick should allow doctors there to do taxpayer-funded abortions. The comments come after the only hospital in the province to do the abortions there announced it would stop.
Last month, the Chalmers hospital in Fredericton announced it would not longer do abortions funded through the nation’s health care plan because it was understaffed in its obstetrics department.
Health Minister Brad Green eventually found two doctors at two unnamed New Brunswick hospitals to perform the tax-funded abortions. Chalmers did more than 400 such abortions last year.
But Vicki Saporta, the head of the National Abortion Federation, says all doctors should be allowed to do the tax-funded abortions if they want to do so.
"Women from different parts of the province wouldn’t have to travel to one or two centers where abortion services are available," she said at a news conference on Friday, according to the CBC.
"There are family physicians who are willing to do abortions," Saporta added, without naming any doctors. "They’re qualified to do them, [and] they provide excellent, very high-quality care."
Saporta urged the province to overturn its abortion laws allowing the tax-funded abortions only in hospitals and with the consent of two doctors.
Without the doctors doing the abortions, women in New Brunswick would not be able to get free abortions and would have to pay as much as $750 for an abortion at the private Morgentaler abortion business in Fredericton.
Henry Morgentaler, the abortion practitioner and business owner, has been embroiled in a lawsuit with the province for years to try to get it to pay for abortions done at his facility.
Last year, Chalmers did 400 of the 404 abortions paid for with public funds. About 600 abortions are done annually at Morgentaler.
