This article was submitted to us by Dr. Azadeh Abbaszadeh, Director of Down syndrome Cellular-Molecular Research Center of Iran, with permission to re-post on Save Down Syndrome.

During prenatal screening tests, if a fetus is diagnosed with Down syndrome, his/her chance of living on planet Earth is pretty slim. Fetuses with Down syndrome are usually aborted. In other words, they are killed.

Prenatal screening tests can determine the likelihood of having a fetus with Down syndrome and, based on their results and data, only those fetuses who are considered healthy are permitted to live and other fetuses who are considered as defective ones are usually aborted.

Now, the million-dollar questions are:

To what extent do prenatal screening tests, which can assess the probability of having a fetus with Down syndrome, affect humans’ quality of life in the world? Can these screening tests tell us how much a fetus will not be afraid of telling the truth in the future? Can they tell us how well a fetus can have acceptable behavior in the future? Can such screening tests be 100% accurate in determining what kind of fetuses will not murder others, steal things, or cause corruption on planet Earth? Which of these screening tests can tell us how the quality of life of these fetuses, who are human beings, will be like or what kind of fetuses will live in a way that they will never disgrace human dignity? Can these prenatal screening tests indicate how the fetuses that are considered defective by carrying out these tests and based on their results would live and how they would influence other people’s lives and can they compare these fetuses’ impacts on the world around them with the influences of fetuses that are described as healthy fetuses who are regarded worthy of life in the future?

Answering these questions is very essential because, based on the data obtained from these screening tests, an important part of the probable life of many fetuses with Down syndrome has been and is still being disenfranchised. Somehow, it can be stated that these screening tests are one of the most important causes of the dramatic decline in the number of people with Down syndrome worldwide.

Prenatal screening tests are originally designed to indicate fetuses’ genetic status and this is their main use; however, nowadays, these screening tests deviate from their original task and have become death certificates for fetuses with Down syndrome.

According to world statistics, a vast majority of chain murders, robberies, and unethical behaviors have been committed by 46-chromosome people who do not have Down syndrome. These people are those fetuses who were considered healthy, taking the conventional meaning of health into account, and were permitted to be born.

Other questions are:

What is the priority? Does getting the right to life from all fetuses that do not have the appearance of a 46-chromosome human and are far from the well-known standards of human-chromosomal medicine have priority?

Another question is:

Do all of these abortions and costly prenatal screening tests aim at eradicating people with Down syndrome and consequently having a healthier society with a lower health burden and more efficient people? If the answer is yes, then why, despite the massive eradication of people with Down syndrome who to date have been considered as an additional cost, have most of the human equations and calculations still failed? Why don’t you consider high crime rates and deliberate homicides and thefts committed by people who do not have Down syndrome as additional burdens on society? Why are our global communities still overloaded even with the deliberate plans and policies countries adopted to eradicate people with Down syndrome?

Is our decision to abort fetuses with 47 chromosomes right? They are still human beings and we, by applying these health policies, have eradicated them. Are such policies right? Have considering people with Down syndrome as a burden on the shoulders of society and eliminating them made the world a better place?

Another question is:

Will the world miss out on something without people with Down syndrome? If you say No, it will not, I will ask you how do you know? Using what kind of sources did you answer to this question?

How much have we given people with Down syndrome throughout history, where, how, and to what extent have we allowed ourselves to evaluate the world with and without them?

Today, if a fetus is diagnosed with Down syndrome during screening tests, there will be a 98%, 77%, and 92% chance to get aborted in Denmark, France, and the UK, respectively. In the US, this chance is nearly 70%.

The question that matters the most is:

How can a country, a state, a government legalize the abortion of fetuses with Down syndrome every single minute before birth? Especially when we know that a fetus has pain receptors in the twentieth week of its life; therefore, after the twentieth week, the fetus that is aborted grasps all the pain.

Is permitting people to abort a fetus with Down syndrome until birth a philanthropic decision?

Is permitting people to abort a fetus with Down syndrome until birth a moral decision?

Is being silent against such laws compatible with human standards?

A while ago, Eric Torell, a 20-year-old man with Down syndrome who lived in Sweden, was mistakenly killed by a Swedish police officer just because he was playing with a toy gun. A few years ago, Ethan Saylor, a 26-year-old man with Down syndrome who lived in the United States, decided to see a movie twice at the cinema and he did not have a ticket for the second time. He did not know that he had to buy another ticket. The deputies put Ethan on the floor, held him down, and handcuffed him, a witness said. He died later because of a fracture in his throat cartilage.

Here, I want to address all the 48 countries that voted in favor of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights:

You, the 48 countries that agreed to the 30 articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, have never passed a declaration or a statement for Eric or Ethan. There are many people like Eric and Ethan out there, I beg all of you, the 48 countries that voted in favor of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, to choose one of the two proposed ways.

Either restore your votes or once again gather together at the UN General Assembly in 2020, look into each other’s eyes, and ask yourselves what have you done for people with Down syndrome? How did you react to the law of aborting fetuses with Down syndrome at any time up until birth? Or in other words, have you ever reacted? Do you, the 48 countries, still want to be silent and let many fetuses with Down syndrome die?

And I have a question with a very clear and explicit answer from the UN:

I urge the United Nations to clearly state the number of chromosomes when referred to the term human, which is repeatedly used in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights; in other words, it should be precisely mentioned that how many chromosomes a human must have to be considered human by the United Nations and to be able to defend his/her rights in the context of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Ladies and Gentlemen:

Here I quote from about seventy years ago; from the original text of the preface of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted on the morning of December 10th in 1948 :

" … WHEREAS the peoples of the United Nations have in the Charter reaffirmed their faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person …"