Abortion and contraception are medically and morally different, and should not be confused.

Conception refers to the moment at which the sperm penetrates and fertilises the ovum to form a zygote. At the precise moment of conception – when the male genetic material from the sperm joins with the female genetic material in the ovum – a woman is pregnant with a new and different individual inside her body; a new human being has been formed!

The implantation of the newly created human embryo into the wall of the uterus is a separate event, occurring about seven to eight days after conception. A woman is pregnant because conception has occurred, not because implantation has occurred. This distinction is important.

Contraception is a method of preventing conception. Condoms and diaphragms (barrier methods) which prevent sperm and ovum from meeting are contraception. The use of spermicide is contraception. The use of chemicals which prevent the ovum from being released from the ovary (so, therefore, it cannot be fertilised) is contraception. Obviously, any drug or device used after conception has occurred cannot be termed a contraceptive.

Abortion is the termination of a pregnancy by the removal or expulsion of a foetus or embryo from the woman’s body, resulting in the death of the foetus or embryo. The correct term to describe any substance, mechanism, device or procedure which interferes with a pregnancy after conception has occurred is abortifacient. Coils and loops (called intra-uterine devices, or IUDs) are abortifacients because they prevent the zygote or embryo from implanting in the wall of the uterus by blocking it. Some do fail; it is not unknown for a baby to be born with the coil or loop wrapped around his or her head.

It is medically and morally dishonest to advertise IUDs as contraceptives, because they are not; they do not prevent conception; they prevent implantation, and, therefore, induce abortion; they are abortifacients.

Recently, advertisements have appeared on Jamaican television promoting emergency contraceptive pills, sometimes referred to as the morning-after pill. These pills, we are told, may be taken up to a few days after unprotected sexual intercourse, and will prevent pregnancy. This, of course, is false and misleading.

Conception (fertilisation of the egg by the sperm) takes place from a few minutes to a few hours after unprotected sexual intercourse. The so-called ’emergency contraceptive pill’ do not prevent conception at all; and can’t, since it will have been taken hours or probably days after fertilisation has already taken place; what it does is induce the body to abort the embryo. The ’emergency contraceptive pill’ is an abortifacient.

In my religious tradition, both abortion and contraception by artificial means are considered wrong and against God’s law; but abortion is much more serious, since it takes human life.

Dishonest

Many Jamaicans do not agree with the position the Catholic Church takes on contraception, but are strongly against abortion, against ‘dashing away the baby’. Just a few months ago, the laws making abortion illegal in Jamaica were confirmed and enshrined in the new Charter of Rights in the Constitution of Jamaica.

It is medically and morally dishonest to advertise something as a contraceptive that is really an abortifacient. I am sure that women who are firmly against abortion have been duped into using IUDs or taking the ’emergency contraceptive pill’ by false and misleading advertising.

I wonder whether the provision of these devices and chemicals to the public by doctors, nurses and pharmacists is not unconstitutional and, therefore, illegal? I hope that the pro-life lobby will put this question to the legal test in the constitutional court!

The dishonesty goes even deeper. In an effort to promote abortion (and irresponsible sexual behaviour), some people argue that a woman should have the right to decide what happens to her own body and, therefore, she should be able to ‘dash weh di baby’ if she doesn’t want it. Of course, the undeniable flaw in this argument is that the baby is not part of the woman’s body; the baby is dependent upon the woman’s body for food and oxygen, but is not a part of her body: different DNA, often different blood type.

Another piece of dishonesty is to define pregnancy as beginning at implantation; and yet another is to claim that human life only begins at ‘viability’ (the ability to live outside the womb).

Let us have some truth and honesty in these matters.

Peter Espeut is a sociologist and Roman Catholic deacon. Email feedback to [email protected].