Couple 'told abortion not allowed'
The widower of an Savita Halappanavar who died in hospital in Ireland after suffering a miscarriage has said a consultant told the couple an abortion was not allowed because “this is a Catholic country”.
The Indian dentist was 17 weeks pregnant when admitted to University Hospital Galway on October 21 last year and died a week later from suspected septicaemia, days after she lost her baby.
The 31-year-old’s widower, Praveen, today told an inquest that consultant Katherine Astbury twice dismissed requests for a termination and told the couple it was because the foetus was alive.
Mr Halappanavar said that on Tuesday October 23 last year, his wife requested a termination for a second time.
“Dr Astbury came in,” he said.
“Savita asked her, can you terminate the baby?’
“She said ’unfortunately I cannot. This is a Catholic country, We are bound by the law. We cannot terminate the foetus when it’s still alive’.”
Mr Halappanavar said his wife cried and told the doctor she was Hindu and not an Irish citizen.
“Dr Astbury said ’sorry’,” Mr Halappanavar added.
The widower told the inquest his wife was in a great deal of pain, distressed and in shock after being told the previous day that the foetus was still alive.
He said she had been admitted to hospital a few hours after going to the bathroom and saying that she “felt something hard come out and had to push it back”.
The widower told the court how his wife cried loudly as the couple were told by a doctor that the cervix was open and the baby would not survive.
“He said it will all be over in a few hours,” Mr Halappanavar said.
“I asked what that meant. We wanted to go home. She was in shock.
“He said in four to five hours it will be all over and then she could go home.”
Mr Halappanavar outlined in detail the care given to his wife in the following days.
He said: “Dr Astbury said because the foetus was still alive she could not terminate it.
“Savita asked the doctor for a termination two times. She was in distress. She couldn’t take it.”
Mr Halappanavar said from the outset of the pregnancy his wife had lower back pain, which she had suffered from since college and from standing for long periods of time while she worked as a dentist in India.
His wife’s parents had visited from India and held a baby shower to celebrate the pregnancy in September, but her pain got so bad that she went to the hospital for a check-up.
Her blood pressure, heart rate and urine were checked and she was sent home.
Mr Halappanavar said his wife was in excellent health, athletic, did yoga, and had no need to visit a GP before her pregnancy.
The inquest at the courthouse in Galway city is scheduled to last at least one week.
Medics involved in treating Mrs Halappanavar will be called to give evidence along with experts including former master of the National Maternity Hospital Dr Peter Boylan.
More than 60 statements have been furnished by health chiefs and gardai for the coroner, Dr Ciaran MacLoughlin, including some from hospital staff, gardai, pathologists, a consultant obstetrician and a microbiologist had been taken, but not all would appear as witnesses.
Mr Halappanavar, a 34-year-old engineer at Boston Scientific in Galway, moved to Ireland in 2006 and a year later he married Savita in a Hindu ceremony in India. They always planned to have a child in 2012, he said.
