Current State of The Law
Advances in the state of the art in medical science, including medical knowledge related to the viability of the fetus, and the ease with which the fetus can be observed in the womb as a living being, treated clinically as a human being, and (by certain stages) demonstrate neural and other processes considered as human, have led a number of jurisdictions – in particular in the United States – to supplant or abolish this common law principle.
Examples of the evidence cited can be found within studies in ultrasonography, fetal heart monitoring, fetoscopy, and behavioral neuroscience. Studies in Neonatal perception suggest that the physiology required for consciousness does not exist prior to the 28th week, as this is when the thalamic afferents begin to enter the cerebral cortex. How long it takes for the requisite connection to be properly established is unknown at this time. Additionally, it is unclear whether the presence of certain hormones may keep the fetal brain sedated until birth.
Read more about this topic: Born Alive Rule
Famous quotes containing the words current state of, current, state and/or law:
“Reputation runs behind the current state of affairs.”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)
“We hear the haunting presentiment of a dutiful middle age in the current reluctance of young people to select any option except the one they feel will impinge upon them the least.”
—Gail Sheehy (b. 1937)
“An alliance is like a chain. It is not made stronger by adding weak links to it. A great power like the United States gains no advantage and it loses prestige by offering, indeed peddling, its alliances to all and sundry. An alliance should be hard diplomatic currency, valuable and hard to get, and not inflationary paper from the mimeograph machine in the State Department.”
—Walter Lippmann (1889–1974)
“Faith, I have been a truant in the law,
And never yet could frame my will to it,
And therefore frame the law unto my will.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)