Surely more than one you know someone who was born with harelip and maybe also with the cleft palate. If it’s not personally, you may have seen a movie of the actor Joaquin Phoenix (in the photo above), or that you know Carmit Bachar, one of the members of the group Pussycat Dolls.
The cleft lip and cleft palate are birth malformations that, although they require surgery to repair them, are usually considered minor. In the last five years abortions have tripled in the UK because fetuses come with these malformations and this has generated controversy, since the activist movements consider it inconceivable to prioritize the appearance over life.
Cleft lip and cleft palate
The causes of these malformations are diverse. There is a genetic component, but it can also happen due to illness during pregnancy or drug use (also tobacco and alcohol).
Cleft lip and cleft palate, as we read in Medline (US National Health Library) can occur together with other congenital syndromes or anomalies.
He harelip It is a cleft in the lip that can be small or can reach the base of the nose, separating the lip into two parts. He cleft palateOn the other hand, it is a similar condition (a cleft) that can be on the right and / or left side of the palate, which can be both small and encompass the entire palate.
These two malformations make it more difficult to feed the baby, so that the mouth can communicate with the nose so that milk flows out of the nostrils and increases the risk of otitis. In the long term, depending on the progress, language may be difficult and monitoring by speech therapists and orthodontists may be necessary, due to the position of the teeth.
In any case, the prognosis is good: most babies will be fine, without more difference with the rest that the scar may be left after an intervention that is usually performed between six weeks of life and nine months. If there is also a cleft palate, another intervention may be necessary later, because during the first year it closes on its own.
Thirty babies in three years
According to the United Kingdom government in the last three years they have been 30 baby abortions because they had a cleft lip or cleft palate. In 2011 and 2012, four abortions were performed for this cause. In 2013 there were nine, in 2014 ten and in 2015 eleven are counted, as we read in DailyMail.
Concern is growing, as the trend seems to be increasing, and given that possibility there are several organizations that are beginning to call for sanity. From the pro-life group All Party Parliamentary Pro-Life Group, Tory MP Fiona Bruce said the following:
It is worrying if these figures reflect a growing interest in society to disproportionately value the physically perfect and beautiful.
Also, religious entities have been added to the debate so that, in some way, the Abortion Law eliminate the possibility of doing it for this reason. In fact, the Rev. Joanna Jepson has been behind this fight for years, after a couple aborted her baby in the 28th week of gestation in 2003 for having a cleft palate.
What do you think about it? Should the law avoid abortion in these cases?
