Coming Home

Brent Rooney (MSc) is Research Director, Reduce Preterm Risk Coalition, Vancouver, Canada. He forwarded this to me today for publication. Do visit Brent’s site!!

Many Thanks Brent.

From Brent Rooney:

This is news you will NOT read in the New York Times:

15 April 2010

Justice For Kids Now Bulletin
Brent Rooney (MSc, http://www.justiceforkids.webs.com )

Polish Pope Prevents Cerebral Palsy

[ http://justiceforkids.webs.com/ch12popepreventscp.htm ]

In April 2010 the plane crash death of Polish President Lech
Kacyznski and many Polish government officials will keep
a tremendous Polish achievement hidden from public view.

Between 1989 and 2006 Poland accomplished what the much
more advanced USA has never achieved: the incidence of
SEVERE Cerebral Palsy ( CP ) in children under age 5 years
was slashed by an astonishing 71%. Pope John Paul II (born
in Poland) played a major role in this ‘medical miracle’. Here’s
the background: Even critics concede that Pope John Paul II
accelerated the decline and defeat of Communism in Europe
with Poland becoming free of the Soviet yoke in 1989. In
1989 a new Polish law strictly limiting access to abortion came
into effect. (Brent Rooney in NOT a Catholic). Result: in the
years 1989-1993 the total of Polish IAs (Induced Abortions)
per 1,000 births plunged by 98% according to the UN Demo-
graphic Yearbook. Before the new law was passed abortion
supporters predicted dire warnings that women’s health would
degenerate, if the legislation was made law. Premature birth
is the most important CP risk factor for a newborn baby. If
abortion increases the risk of premature birth (it does!!), then
one would expect to see Poland’s preterm birth rate decline
5 to 10 years after the steep decline is yearly induced
abortions began (i.e. some year between 1994 and 1999 in
Poland’s case).

Between 1995 and 1997 Poland’s maternal mortality plunged
by 41% and the rate of extremely premature (under 28 weeks’
gestation) plummeted by 21%, a result never matched by the
U.S. in the last 40 years. In a very large 2008 study Dr.
Eveline Himpens and colleagues reported that extremely
premature newborns had 129 times the CP risk as did full-term
newborn babies. Compared to the death rate of children
under age 5 years with CP ( 1985-1988 ) the 1996 death
rate was 42.4% lower; the CP death rate for such
children in 2006 was 71% lower than the average CP death
rate in 1985-1988 ( 17 per 100,000 Polish children under age
5 years). This implied that the incidence of SEVERE CP
declined by about 71%, since the more severe a case
of CP the higher the risk of death under age 5 years.

From whence comes Poland’s CP death rate data for
children under age 5 years for the years 1985 to 2006? As
result of a request from Brent Rooney, Poland’s Deputy
Director of the CSO (Central Statistical Office), Witold
Marek Wozniak (Email: M.Wolowicz@stat.gov.pl ),
sent CP death data for the years 1985-2006 on 12 June
2008. Those who are skeptical of the statistics above
from Poland can contact Deputy Director directly and ask
him for the data. [a copy of Wozniak’s Excel data is in
the Appendix to this Bulletin.]

In 2002 Dr Bo Jacobsson ( bo.jacobsson@obgyn.gu.se )
and colleagues reported that Swedish women with prior IAs
have 60% higher relative odds (i.e. 1.6 times the odds) of
having a newborn baby with Cerebral Palsy compared to
Swedish women with zero prior induced abortions.[1] Dr.
Jacobsson was approximately 93% confident of higher CP
risk for women with prior IAs compared to women with
zero prior induced abortions..[1]

………………………………………………………………………..

Brent Rooney (MSc)
Research Director, Reduce Preterm Risk Coalition
3456 Dunbar St. (Suite 146)
Vancouver, Canada V6S 2C2
web: http://www.justiceforkids.webs.com
http://www.jpands.org/vol13no4/rooney.pdf
email: fullterm40@gamil.com

Reference
1 B Jacobsson, G Hagberg, B Hagberg, L Ladfors,
A Niklasson, H Hagberg. Cerebral palsy in preterm
infants: a population-based case-control study
of antenatal and intrapartal risk factors. Acta
Paediatrica 2002;91:946-951

Appendix: Polish CP death data

The following data was sent by Poland’s CSO (Central
Statistical Office) Deputy Director Witold Wozniak to
Brent Rooney ( fullterm40@gamil.com ) on 12 June 2008
(deaths of Polish children under age 5 with Cerebral
Palsy (CP)):

Deaths for
children under
age 5 years Live Deaths/
Year old with CP Births 100,000
1985 104 680,091 15.3
1986 130 637,213 20.4
1987 95 607,790 15.6
1988 98 598,938 16.6
1989 93 564,431 16.5
1990 72 547,720 13.1
1991 54 547,719 9.9
1992 68 515,214 13.2
1993 51 494,310 10.3
1994 47 481,285 9.8
1995 47 438,109 10.9
1996 42 428.203 9.8
1997* 20 412.635 4.8
1998 23 395,619 5.8
1999 16 382,002 4.2
2000 17 378,348 4.5
2001 16 368,205 4.3
2002 19 353,765 5.4
2003 15 351,072 4.3
2004 5 356,131 1.4
2005 9 364,383 2.5
2006 9 374,244 2.4

*In 1997 Poland converted to the new ICD 9
(International Classification of Disease,
9th revision) definition of CP