WASHINGTON (July 21, 2000) -- Helen Alvare, Director of Planning and Information for the Secretariat for Pro-Life Activities of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops, today responded to a statement issued by the National Abortion and Reproductive Rights Action League (NARAL). NARAL's statement was issued at yesterday's House Judiciary Subcommittee hearing on the Born-Alive Infants Protection Act (H.R. 4292), a bill to recognize fully born infants as persons. NARAL said: "This bill attempts to inject Congress into what should be personal and private decisions about medical treatment."

Below is the text of Ms. Alvare's reaction:

"It happened sooner than we feared, but it was not unexpected. Abortion advocates now insist that the decision to kill a fully born infant, at any stage of development, is a personal and private medical decision. Evidence of this frightening opinion first surfaced in the course of the partial-birth abortion debate. The pro-life community predicted that failure to stop partial-birth abortion would lead to infanticide. And now, only three weeks after the Supreme Court invalidated a partial-birth abortion ban, NARAL is arguing for precisely that.

Nothing could prove more persuasively the need for Congress to reaffirm the obvious fact that live-born infants are persons. If our lawmakers do not take a stand now, whose life will be next?"

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