Providers
The abortion providers
This section looks at the abortion providers themselves. Abortion is not legal in Ireland so there are no clinics offering abortions here. However, there are referral agencies who refer women for abortions to England and promote and campaign for abortion to be legalized here.
We include quotes from abortionists and former abortionists as direct quotations from the industry are very telling.
Abortionist Christensen shows his work
Watch this brutal video of abortionist Christensen talking about his work in Madison Abortion Clinic, in Madison, USA
Quotes from the abortion providers
What is the best way to learn about abortion? To actually witness an abortion first hand or to work in a clinic. The second best thing is to read verified eye-witness accounts from people who are current and former abortion providers. These quotes have been tracked down from a number of sources, from the research of 'pro-choice' author Magda Denes to the Washington Post and other magazines.
Each of the ‘contents of the uterus’ was placed in a clear glass bowl and then examined under a light. One bowl clearly contained 3 perfect, tiny arms. I asked why there would be a third arm. ‘Twins’ was the response and because it might upset the mother, this information was never shared with any mother.
- Sue Thayer, Former abortion practitioner of Planned Parenthood
"They [the women] are never allowed to look at the ultrasound because we knew that if they so much as heard the heart beat, they wouldn’t want to have an abortion."
Dr. Randall, former abortionist
"Even now I feel a little peculiar about it, because as a physician I was trained to conserve life, and here I am destroying it."
Dr. Benjamin Kalish, abortionist
"You have to become a bit schizophrenic. In one room, you encourage the patient that the slight irregularity in the fetal heart is not important, that she is going to have a fine, healthy baby. Then, in the next room you assure another woman, on whom you just did a saline abortion, that it is a good thing that the heartbeat is already irregular… she has nothing to worry about, she will NOT have a live baby… All of a sudden one noticed that at the time of the saline infusion there was a lot of activity in the uterus. That’s not fluid currents. That’s obviously the fetus being distressed by swallowing the concentrated salt solution and kicking violently and that’s to all intents and purposes, the death trauma… somebody has to do it, and unfortunately we are the executioners in this instance[.]"
Dr. John Szenes, abortionist
Telling those women their fetuses feel pain is heaping torment upon torment. These women have real pain. They did not come to this decision easily. Creating another barrier for them to get the medical care they need is really unfair.
Abortionist Dave Turok
"This is why I hate overuse of forceps – things tear. There are only two kinds of doctors who have never perforated a uterus, those that lie and those who don’t do abortions."
Anonymous Abortionist
"I got to where I couldn’t stand to look at the little bodies anymore."
Dr. Beverly McMillan, former abortionist
"I think in many ways I’ve been lucky to have been part of this. If I hadn’t gotten involved, I would have gone through life probably being perfectly satisfied to go to the medical society parties and it would have been very, very dull. I would have been bored silly." D
Dr. Jane Hodgson, late abortionist
Sorrow, quite apart from the sense of shame, is exhibited in some way by virtually every woman for whom I performed an abortion, and that’s 20,000 as of 1995. The sorrow is revealed by the fact that most women cry at some point during the experience… The grieving process may last from several days to several years… Grief is sometimes delayed… The grief may lie sublimated and dormant for years.
Dr. Susan Poppema, abortionist
"If I see a case…after twenty weeks, where it frankly is a child to me, I really agonize over it because the potential is so imminently there…On the other hand, I have another position, which I think is superior in the hierarchy of questions, and that is “who owns this child?” It’s got to be the mother."
Dr. James McMahon, abortionist
"We know that it’s killing, but the state permits killing under certain circumstances."
Dr. Neville Sender, abortionist
"I accept that abortion stops a beating heart and I accept that abortion ends a potential human life, even in the very earliest weeks of pregnancy."
Ann Furedi
Chief Executive of the Abortion Chain British Pregnancy Advisory Service, November 2011.
Read more on her comments here...
So any pretence that abortion is not killing is a signal of our ambivalence, a signal that we cannot say yes, it kills a fetus.
Faye Wattleton
Former president of Planned Parenthood, the major US abortion provider, Ms Magazine, 1997
"Every woman has these same two questions: First, 'Is it a baby?' 'No' the counselor assures her. "It is a product of conception (or a blood clot, or a piece of tissue).... How many women would have an abortion, if they told them the truth?"
Carol Everett
Former owner of two clinics and director of four and author of A Walk Through an Abortion Clinic
"The counsellor at our clinic would cry with the girls at the drop of a hat. She would find their weakness and work on it. The women were never given any alternatives. They were told how much trouble it is to have a baby."
Debra Henry
Quoted in the film Meet the Abortion Providers 1989
I have been there, and I have seen these totally formed babies as early as ten weeks... with the leg missing, or with their head off. I have seen the little rib cages.
Debra Henry
Quoted in The Ex Abortionists: They Have Confronted Reality Washington Post April 1, 1988 p a21
"I got to where I couldn't stand to look at the little bodies anymore"
Dr. Beverly McMillan
When asked why she stopped performing abortions. Quoted in The Ex Abortionists: They Have Confronted Reality Washington PostApril 1, 1988 p a21
"I want the general public to know what the doctors know- that this is a person, this is a baby. That this is not some kind of blob of tissue"
Dr. Anthony Levantino
During a conference in Chicago in 1989 : Meet the Abortion Providers
"I have taken the lives of innocent babies, and I have ripped them from their mother's wombs with a powerful suction machine"
Dr. McArthur Hill
Speaking to the public and other abortionists in Illinois
"The doctors would remove the fetus while performing hysterotomies and then lay it on the table., where it would squirm until it died. ..They all had perfect forms and shapes. I couldn't take it. No nurse could."
Joyce Craig
Director of a Brooklyn clinic of Planned Parenthood, who assisted in abortions for two months, then quit
When I put my hands on somebody to feel how big they are and I get kicked, I am barely able to talk at that moment.
From the article Abortion Providers Share Inner Conflicts which appeared in the July 12 1993 issue of AAA News, a publication of the American Medical Association
"It's hard to be in a profession where you have a hard time answering the questions that other people ask you about what you do."
From the article Abortion Providers Share Inner Conflicts which appeared in the July 12 1993 issue of AAA News, a publication of the American Medical Association
"Remember, there is a human being at the other end of the table taking that kid apart. We've had a couple of guys drinking too much, taking drugs, even a suicide or two."
Dr. Julius Butler
Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Minnesota Medical School
"After an abortion, the doctor must inspect these remains to make sure that all the fetal parts and placenta have been removed. Any tissue left inside the uterus can start an infection. Dr. Bours squeezed the contents of the sock into a shallow dish and poked around with his finger. 'You can see a teeny tiny hand' he said."
Abortion clinic worker
The Abortion Conflict, New York Times Magazine 11/8/1985
"I dismember the foetus - pull it apart limb from limb - and remove it piece by piece and two hours later I've forgotten them.
Abortionist
Professor Phillip Bennett, who carried out England's first selective abortion where one twin was killed and the other allowed to live. Sunday Independent, 11/8/1996
"I remember an experience as a resident on a hysterotomy. I remember seeing the baby move underneath the sack of membranes, as the cesarean incision was made, before the doctor broke the water. The thought came to me, "My God, that's a person" Then he broke the water. And when he broke the water, it was like I had a pain in my heart, just like when I saw that first suction abortion.
And then he delivered the baby,. and I couldn't touch it.. I wasn't much of an assistant. I just stood there, and the reality of what was doing on finally began to seep into my calloused brain and heart. They took that little baby that was making little sounds and moving and kicking, and set it on that table in a cold, stainless steel bowl. Every time I would look over while we were repairing the incision in uterus and finishing the Caesarean, I would see that little person moving in that bowl. And it kicked and moved less and less, of course, as time went on. I can remember going over and looking at the baby when we were done with the surgery and the baby was still alive.
You could see the chest was moving and the heart was beating, and the baby would try to take a little breath, and it really hurt inside, and it began to educate me as to what abortion really was."
Dr. David Brewer
Quoted in "Pro-Choice 1990: Skeletons in the Closet"
"From May to November 1988, I worked for an abortionist. He specializes in third trimester killings. I witnessed evidence of the brutal, cold blooded murder of over 600 viable, healthy babies at seven, eight and nine months gestation. A very, very few of these babies, less than 2%, were handicapped...I thought I was pro-choice and I was glad to be working in an abortion clinic.
I thought I was helping provide a noble service to women in crisis....I was instructed to falsify the age of the babies in medical records. I was required to lie to the mothers over the phone, as they scheduled their appointments, and to tell them that they were not 'too far along' Then I had to note, in the records that Dr. Tiller's needle had successfully pierced the walls of the baby's heart, injecting the poison what brought death...
One day, Dr. Tiller came up the stairs from the basement, where the mothers were in labor. He was carrying a large cardboard box, and ducked into the employees only area of the office so that he wouldn't have to walk through the waiting room. He passed behind my desk as I sat working on the computer, and he turned the corner to go around a short hall.
He called out for me to come and help him. the box was so big and heavy in his arms that he couldn't get the key into the lock. So I unlocked the door for him, and , pushing the door open, I saw very clearly the gleaming metal of the crematorium- a full sized crematorium, just like the one's used in funeral homes.
I went back to my computer. I could hear Dr. Tiller firing up the gas oven. A few minutes later I could smell burning human flesh. Mine was the agony of a participant, however reluctant, in the act of prenatal infanticide."
Luhra Tivis
On her experience in the abortion business Quoted in Celebrate Life Sept/Oct 1994
"Where is the Real Violence?"
"I was trained by a professional marketing director in how to sell abortions over the telephone. He took every one of our receptionists, nurses, and anyone else who would deal with people over the phone through an extensive training period. The object was, when the girl called, to hook the sale so that she wouldn't get an abortion somewhere else, or adopt out her baby, or change her mind. We were doing it for the money."
Nina Whitten
Chief Secretary at a Dallas abortion clinic under Dr. Curtis Boyd, Pro-Choice 1990: Skeletons in the Closet. New Dimensions magazine
"Another thing that bothered me as I went about my work at the clinic was the fact that I had seen an ultrasound abortion. We did first trimester abortions. This was a late first trimester, probably second trimester. I handled the ultrasound while the doctor performed the procedure and I directed him while I was watching the screen.
I saw the baby pull away. I saw the baby open his mouth. I had seen the Silent Scream a number of times, but it didn't effect me. To me it was just more pro-life propaganda. But I couldn't deny what I saw on the screen."
Joan Appleton
Former clinic worker
"Population control is too important to be stopped by some right wing pro-life types. Take the new influx of Hispanic immigrants. Their lack of respect for democracy and social order is frightening. I hope I can do something to stem that tide; I'd set up a clinc in Mexico for free if I could... When a sullen black woman of 17 or 18 can decide to have a baby and get welfare and food stamps and become a burden to all of us, it's time to stop..."
Abortionist Edward Allre
San Diego Union, California, USA
Who has become a millionaire 12 times over from the abortion industry
"One night a lady delivered and I was called to come and see her because she was 'uncontrollable.' I went into the room, and she was going to pieces; she was having a nervous breakdown, screaming and thrashing. The other patients were upset because this lady was screaming. I walked in, and here was this little saline abortion baby kicking.
It had been born alive, and was kicking and moving for a little while before it finally died of those terrible burns, because the salt solution gets into the lungs and burns the lungs too. I'll tell you one thing about D& E. You never have to worry about a baby's being born alive. I won't describe D & E, other than to say that, as a doctor, you are sitting there tearing, and I mean tearing- you need a lot of strength to do it- arms and legs off of babies and putting them in a stack on top of the table."
Dr. David Brewer, Meet the Abortion Providers
"Yes, babies are delivered in the toilet all the time and many times are still alive, wiggling around in the toilet."
Abortionist Randall Whitney
Testifying in a court case against abortionist James Predergraft, Florida, July 2011
Read more on this story here...
Interview with Doctor John Parsons, from Kings College Hospital, London
You have said that you are 'happy' to do abortions. Please explain
Women live in the real world and have real problems. I feel proud to do abortions and believe I am making a positive contribution to society by doing so.
How many abortions have you done?
As a consultant gynecologist I have been responsible for thousands of abortions. Each year I oversee 1,400. This morning I did ten."
You admit abortion is killing?
Abortion is killing. A woman has a right to abort if she feels it is necessary and correct.
It sounds as if you think abortion is a good thing?
No one hates abortion more than I do. In an ideal world there would be no abortions, but the way to stop abortions is to liberalise the laws restricting it. If there were less hurdles to abortion, there would be less need for them.
You say you have just "come out" in the last six months by speaking publicly for abortion on television and radio. Why have you chosen to speak now?
The pro-life movement is having a negative impact on abortion. Sometimes a women change their mind on the operating table and then we lose money! We have to run a cost-effective termination service.
How do you feel personally about the pro-life movement?
I am aggressively anti the Catholic Church and the pro-life people. They are a vocal minority with extremist views.
Do you believe in abortion on demand?
We have abortion on request now. It's what I believe and what I practice. A woman has a right to abort - whether it's to go on a skiing holiday or whether the fetus is disabled.
You have said you would have aborted your first-born son if abortion had been legal. Can you explain?
I was 20 at the time and in medical school. I didn't want a baby and I was not in a position to handle it. If he had been conceived today under these circumstances, I'd have had him aborted.
Is your son offended by this story?
Not at all. He completely agrees with me."
Interview with Doctor John Parsons, from Kings College Hospital, London. The Universe, Sunday 2nd March 1997