"If, however, they knew the truth, which is that artificial abortion, even under the best hospital conditions, is a precarious undertaking, so frequently leading to invalidism as never to be 'safe'; if, moreover, we spread the truth about Russia's legalized abortions, and put a stop to the false reports circulated by ill-informed enthusiasts regarding the ease and safety of skilled induced abortion, we should be going a long way towards reducing criminal or surreptitious abortion to vanishing-point."
Sterilization.—Brief mention must be made of sterilization—an operation whereby further pregnancy is prevented—which has been put forward by certain witnesses as a method of preventing abortion.
Just as therapeutic abortion is, in certain cases, legitimately performed by medical practitioners, so has the operation of sterilization a recognized place in medical treatment of exceptional cases in which a woman's life is likely to be endangered or her health gravely impaired by further pregnancy.
It can, indeed, be reasonably argued that in such cases sterilization is very definitely to be preferred to the very unsatisfactory alternative of repeated therapeutic abortion.
Nevertheless, any general extension of this practice would, in the opinion of the Committee, be open to serious abuse.
The Committee sees a tendency in some quarters to extend the indications for this operation far beyond the bounds of generally accepted medical opinion.
The attitude of the Committee towards this matter is therefore the same as towards more specific legalization of therapeutic abortion.
The Prosecution of the Criminal Abortionist.—A very disquieting aspect of this problem is the relative immunity of the criminal abortionist from punishment. Conviction for the crime is rare, even in cases where guilt appears to be proved beyond all reasonable doubt.
The Committee has sought to discover the reasons for the failure to obtain conviction.
It is apparent that the police authorities are faced with many difficulties. In the first instance conviction is largely dependent on the evidence of a woman who, in the eyes of the law, is an accomplice to the offence, and corroboration of her evidence may be demanded.