Newsgroups: bit.listserv.christia
Date:         Wed, 9 Sep 1992 22:07:44 EDT
From:         MKLINE%VDH.BITNET@VTVM2.CC.VT.EDU
Subject:      RU 486-Part 1

Subject: RU 486-Part 1

    700 Club, 09/08/92, RU 486, Part 1 of 2

    Sheila: Well one highly controversial issue in this year's
presidential election has been abortion, and pro-choice forces have been
lobbying hard for the legalization of RU 486, the abortion pill. But is
the whole story being told about this drug? CBN News reporter Linda
Freeman traveled to Europe to get the answer, and here's the first report
in a two part series.

    Pauline Conner: There's no doubt about this, this is a world wide
experiment on women.

    Linda Freeman: Pauline Conner with Feminists Against Eugenics in
England says that women in the west are being conned by RU 486 abortioning
campaigns.

    PC: They're being sold an idea of the quick, easy abortion. Most
women imagine it's a matter of taking the pill, and the pregnancy
disappearing.

    LF: The media campaign currently underway to legalize RU 486
(Newspaper clip, "RU 486 faces many hurdles by Fern Schumer Chapman"
shown.) in the US, does paint a rosy picture of the pill as a panacea for
all that ails the American abortion industry. Promoted as safe, simple,
and private, RU 486 sounds like a pro-choice dream come true.

    But it was just such a media campaign in England that helped bring
forth the dramatic story of one woman for whom RU 486 is still a worst
nightmare.

    Eileen Mahr - Post-Abortion Stress Counselor: She first came to me
when she heard RU 486 being discussed on Television.

    LF: Eileen Mahr is a Post-Abortion Stress Counselor in a small town
north of London. She told us Josie's story because Josie can no longer
tell it herself. Single, college educated, professionally stable, and
more than 9 weeks pregnant, 25 year old Josie had a nervous breakdown
following her RU 486 abortion.

    EM: After she'd had the tablets of RU 486 she was told to go home for
a few days, and then to return to the hospital for the Prosaglandin. But
before she got back to the hospital, for the Prosaglandin, she started
to bleed, so heavily that everything just GUSHED from her. And she got
out of bed, there was a whole pool of blood on the floor with bits and
pieces of the baby in it...

    LF: Josie's experience revealed the RU 486 abortion process is far
from quick and easy.

    The RU 486 tablets are administered first. This blocks the production
of the pregnancy hormone Progesterone to break down the lining of the
womb without which the fertilized egg cannot survive. This is followed up
by at least doctor's visits over the next few days to receive doses of
hormones called Prostaglandins. Prostaglandins stimulate strong uterine
contractions to technically insure a complete abortion.

    One of the reasons the Food and Drug Administration has banned RU 486
is due to its necessary combination with Prostaglandins for an abortion.

    PC: Prostaglandins are very powerful chemicals. They've been
described by a German feminist, health movement, pro-choice movement as
medical violence against women.

    LF: One woman in France died, and at least 2 others experienced heart
failure with the injectable prostaglandins used there. In England where a
vaginally inserted prostaglandin is being used, some women have
reportedly rupturing of the uterus.

    The combination of RU 486 and prostaglandins is supposed to result in
what would resembles a normal menstrual period for the woman. But Josie's
hemorrhaging and incomplete RU 486 abortion required an emergency surgical
abortion and a blood transfusion. Josie now things she's infertile.

    Dr. Edward Sakie: This is their choice! They know the problems. They
know that they can have heavy bleeding, this is why after the
prostaglandin administration they are staying with the MD's few hours.
This is absolutely known.

    LF: This was Dr. Edward Sakie's reaction to Josie's story when we
read her graphic testimony in his Paris office. Dr. Sakie is the
president of Rasau Uklop(?) or RU, the French pharmaceutical firm that
manufactures RU 486.

    Professor Ettian Baueu(really messing these names up...sorry) is the
scientist who invented RU 486. Professor Baueu does not like the down
side of his RU 486 compound being emphasized, because in his words, "It
doesn't really do anyone any good." He grilled our news crew for 30
minutes about how the information would be presented before he would take
his place for our pre-arranged interview.

    EB: Woman have to realize that RU 486 is not dangerous, much less
than the type of abortion they have currently. And RU-486 with the new
oral prostaglandin, it makes it very simple and very safe.

    LF: The use of an oral prostaglandin was introduced in France 1 month
ago. Both Baueu and Dr. Sakie' claim this form of prostagandin will
virtually eliminate the side effects experienced with injectable and
insertable forms of prostaglandin.

    Dr. Pierre Pechikoff is the head of a maternity ward in the south of
France, New Mercais that has been using the new oral prostaglandin with
RU 486 for Abortions. He acknowledges that very little still is known
about how the oral prostaglandin will affect women.

    Professor Baueu also promotes what he sees as a psychological benefit
of his abortion pill for women.

    PB: They take the pill. They put it in their mouth themselves. It's
not with the instrument. You see the difference? So they have to take the
responsibility. And this may help. (MAKS> Yea, help the abortionist
charge almost the same amount, but be blameless if something goes wrong.
"It's your fault, I didn't twist your arm.")

    Dr. Pechikoff says just the opposite is true.

    DP: It's a lot more damaging because the woman has to make the
decision to take the pill. The physical act makes it worst because she's
fully responsible, not like a doctor aborting her baby.

    LF: Meanwhile, in an interview with a French magazine 2 years ago,
(Le Monde) Dr.  Sakie himself called RU 486 abortion a quote "appalling
psychological ordeal for women." That's because a woman has to quote
"live with her abortion while she bleeds for at least a week." And like
Josie, may even see so called "products of conception" being expelled
(MAKS> hands, feet, arms, legs...looks like a baby, but it's a fetus so
it's "fetus upper appendage ends, fetus lower appendage end, etc.) during
that time.

    In England, Pauline Conner's view is that having the woman take pills
to induce an abortion takes responsibility away from the abortionist.
(MAKS> Looks like I was right.) But Conner's biggest objection to RU 486
is what she says amounts to experimentation on women. According to
Conner, the latest combination of RU 486 with an oral prostaglandin to
see if the process will be made safer just proves her point.

    PC: I don't believe that each development makes the procedure safer.
Because we see at each stage right along the line that each stage is an
experiment...

    LF: Abortion in the UK is not the hot political issue it is in the
US. In fact, RU 486 was licensed here without much public debate or
awareness. But people here are watching the US Presidential race with
great interest, because they know that the outcome of that race will
determine the future of abortion and RU 486 in America.

    Reporting from London, England, I'm Linda Freeman, CBN News.

    Pat: That's a side of RU 486 that we've never seen before.

    Sheila: That's the first time that I've actually understood what it
does to a woman. I mean they make it sound so simple, no risk involved,
and that's obviously a lie.

    Pat: Well I had no idea that it had to be coupled with prostaglandin.
That's something that's more or less a new development because the other
was so painful and bringing on such problems with Patrica Schoder and her
friends in Congress and others supporting 486 are not even talking about
these things.

   End of Article ------------------------------------------------------

    MAKS> Well, did anyone learn anything new? Should I take a stab at
part two tomorrow? At a glance it seems to deal a bit more with who's
promoting it and how it's viewed in England where a street survey showed
a bulk of those surveyed didn't even know what RU 486 was. I would
imagine that once approved in the US we would see commercials all over
the place.  It will be the best thing since the Dalkon Shield.

In His Love,

  Michael A. Kline, Sr. SSE
  Tech Support Manager    804-786-1559    Home:
  Va Dept of Health (FAX: 804-786-7528)   13308 Thornridge Ct.
  1500 E Main St. Room 211-3              Midlothian, VA  23112
  Richmond, Virginia  23219               804-744-9126
  "Know God, Know Peace"                  "No God, No Peace"
  "Champions are not men who never failed, but men who never quit"
                                          Ed Kole