By Susan Brinkmann, OCDS
Staff Writer
A baby born in England at 23 weeks has survived and finally come home from the hospital. Her mother is now calling British abortion laws “outdated” because they are based on the notion that children born at less than 24 weeks cannot survive outside the womb.
According to a report by the London Mail Online, Lexie Slater-Folksman, weighed only 1 lb. 8 oz. at delivery. Her mother, 20 year old Sarah Slater, said she was given only a brief glimpse of her tiny daughter before she was whisked away to the neonatal unit.
“She was absolutely tiny,” Slater said. “It was scary to see her looking like that, so tiny and surrounded by wires. I couldn’t stop crying. Her skin was all red, like she was burnt. Only Richard and I were allowed to touch her. We could put our hands through the side of the incubator at first, then we were allowed to hold her.”
Lexie was so premature her lungs had not developed properly and kept collapsing. Her under-developed eyes were also a problem.
‘She had surgery early on at five weeks because the back of her eyes hadn’t developed,” Slater said. “They were glued shut when she was born.”
However, over the course of the next five months, Lexie defied the odds and continued to grow stronger and stronger.
Now, six months after her birth, she weighs a healthy 8 lbs. and has finally been allowed home.
Slater says Lexie’s case proves that abortion laws allowing children to be aborted at 24 weeks are outdated and should be changed.
In May, the British government voted to keep the upper time limit for abortions at 24 weeks after rejecting proposals to reduce the limit to as little as 12 weeks. Pro-life groups had argued that a baby’s rights should be considered at the point it had the “chance of life.”
Slater agrees. “Some mothers-to-be would be able to legally terminate their pregnancy at 23 weeks – yet my Lexie is living proof babies can survive being born so prematurely. I never realised a baby would be so well developed at 23 weeks and they do have a ‘chance of life.’”
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