Guest Post: As A Doctor, The Vague Wording In Malta’s New Bill Scares Me
The government is proposing a bill that at face value is based on solid principle – that is, that if a mother’s life is at serious risk, abortion (a medical term used to describe termination of pregnancy – whether natural or clinical) is permissible.
The Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister claim that this bill is desperately needed to free us from any grey areas, and from situations where a mother and a doctor may be prosecuted for performing the only viable option other than allowing both mother and baby to die.
And guess what? They are right.
So, if they are so worried about removing vague grey areas and creating litigious situations, why insist on keeping the current proposed wording of the amendment? Wording that does the exact opposite, i.e. introduce vague grey areas and create litigious situations.
Let me explain. I am a doctor, and this bill scares me. You see, when a law states “life […] in grave jeopardy” we all understand that. It’s simple – high risk of death.
However, when it states, “health in grave jeopardy”, what does that mean? There is no definition of health in Maltese law.
A recent protest in Valletta against the abortion bill
If we extend our search to British common law (on which much of our laws are based), we again come up empty-handed. If we go further afield, we can find a definition, completely outside the law, given by the World Health Organisation in 1948, which states: “Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity”.
So, if we were to use this interpretation, is one to assume that if social well-being is in grave jeopardy, then abortion is legally permissible? Well, I hope not, if we are to believe that this is not a bill introducing abortion on request.
To complicate things further, even scientific research shows that when it comes to health “definitions of practitioners were sometimes radically different from one another” (Julliard et al. 2006).
Our Prime Minister has brushed this question aside stating that he trusts doctors’ judgement. Yet in the very same breath he tells us that anyone who stretches, or abuses of this law will feel the full force of our legal system.
So put yourselves in a doctor’s shoes. Do you feel confident in deciding? Do you feel confident enough to risk your license and possible jail time?
With this conundrum in mind, the Prime Minister was asked if clear guidelines will be given to doctors. To which he answered that we will follow best practice. A nice sounding phrase with absolutely no meaning, which points us in absolutely no direction.
So, my question to our law makers is this – do you want to eradicate vagueness and produce clarity, or eradicate clarity and produce vagueness? Which is it? My plea is simple. Make things clear. Crystal clear.
Paul Cassar is a psychiatry trainee
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