British Agency Clears Pro-Life Doc Who Talked Patients Out of Abortions
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by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
July 7, 2008
London, England (LifeNews.com) — A British agency that regulates physicians has cleared a pro-life doctor of any wrongdoing after abortion advocates accused her of bullying her patients. Dr. Tammie Downes says she’s only guilty of looking out for the best interests of mother and child when she talked women patients out of abortions.
The General Medical Council investigated Downes after complaints from a pro-abortion physician upset by her actions.
Downes has practiced medicine for 13 years and says she would readily talk to women about abortion alternatives, including keeping the baby.
Through her efforts, she says one-third of her patients in crisis pregnancy situations didn’t have an abortion and credits the counseling with saving at least eight babies.
The GMC found that Downes did not breach its medical and ethical guidelines with the counseling and the decision prevents her from being removed from the medical register of licensed physicians.
"It was a worrying time and it felt completely unjust because I was sure that I was doing the job of a good GP – not something I should be suspended for," Downes told the London Telegraph newspaper. "What they were accusing me of was ridiculous."
Downes said she was worried about fellow physicians coming under similar complaints from abortion advocates and she was concerned a negative decision from the GMC would make other doctors wary about helping women seek abortion alternatives.
"I am carrying on as I have always done – offering women alternatives and helping them to think through the decision they are making," Downs told the Telegraph.
"Doctors who say it is a woman’s right to have an abortion and tick the box without looking at the other options and implications of having an abortion are not doing the patient any favors," she added.
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