DRUGS
The French government’s approval of the RU 486 abortion pill has reignited intense debate in the United States over abortion-inducing drugs. Most agree it will be years before RU 486 wins approval in the United States, if it ever does. But other abortion drugs are closer to reality, and many prolifers fear France’s acceptance of RU 486 could have wide-ranging implications for the use of abortion-inducing drugs in the U.S. and around the world.
Ingested in pill form during the early weeks of pregnancy, RU 486 deprives the developing fetus of the vital nutritional hormone progesterone, resulting in a spontaneous abortion. According to Roussel Uclaf, the French company marketing the drug, RU 486 induces abortion 80 percent of the time when taken alone, and it is 95 percent efficient when taken with another prostaglandin drug.
The drug is now available in France and China, and the World Health Organization is testing it in several other countries, including Sweden, Hungary, Great Britain, Italy, Cuba, Singapore, and India. While family-planning groups and abortion advocates consider the marketing of RU 486 a key victory, prolife groups such as the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC) say the battle is not over yet.
So far, international prolife groups have not announced formal plans to protest the marketing of the drug, but they are forming a strategy. NRLC president John Willke said an international boycott is one of the options being discussed. “If we do anything, it will not be impulsive,” he said. “And if we do pull a boycott, it will be a doozy.”
Willke said there has been inadequate testing of the drug and its possible medical implications for women. He said he is particularly concerned about the drug’s use in Third World countries in areas where there is limited access to direct physician supervision.
Coming To The U.S.?
Opposition from the prolife movement has limited the progress of RU 486 in this country. So far, there have been no applications to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for licensing of the drug. But advocates of RU 486 hope its increased international marketing will boost its prospects in the U.S. Willke said drug could also enter the country through “bootlegging.”
Meanwhile, other drugs with potential abortion implications are being pushed forward. An FDA advisory committee has given tentative approval to Cytotec, a drug designed to prevent ulcers and stomach problems in arthritis patients. A product of G. D. Searle & Co., Cytotec has not been developed as an abortion drug, but is known to have abortion-inducing effects.
Proponents of the drug testified at the FDA hearing that Cytotec should be clearly labeled as dangerous to pregnant women, and that physicians would have to be educated about its abortion-inducing properties. The NRLC and other prolife groups oppose the drug. “Once it is known that [Cytotec] aborts babies,” said Willke, “there will be people using it, wanting it, and prescribing it.”
Prolife groups are also keeping an eye on Epostane, a drug that at one time was being developed by Kodak-owned Sterling Drugs. Like RU 486, Epostane targets the hormone progesterone. Sterling has announced it is no longer researching the drug and thus has no intentions of marketing it. Willke said the NRLC wants to make sure that doesn’t change.
By Kim A. Lawton.
World Scene
CUBA
Restricted, But Growing
Despite pressure characterized more as annoyance than persecution, Christians in Cuba continue to report progress.
For example, Ecuadorian missionary Rodrigo Zapata spent 11 days in Cuba last summer conducting Bible studies and workshops for more than 60 pastors. He says there is no “organized persecution” of the evangelical church, but “for an active Christian, it is difficult to obtain a job.” Zapata, whose trip was sponsored by HCJB World Radio, estimates 5 there are 30,000 evangelical Christians (.3 percent of the population) in Cuba.
This fall John Huffman, Jr., pastor of Saint Andrew’s Presbyterian Church in Newport Beach, California, preached at a weekend series of meetings in a local church in the interior of Cuba. Huffman’s father, John, Sr., had pioneered a radio ministry in Cuba in the 1940s. Both Huffmans were invited back to Cuba by B. G. Lavastida, who had helped with the radio ministry. “I preached … to people eager to hear the Word of God declared by a brother from another culture, but one who was trusted by a fellow believer in Jesus Christ,” Huffman told his congregation.
JAPAN
Where Abortion Is Routine
A very small prolife movement in Japan is trying to counter the almost universal acceptance of abortion in that nation. According to Pro-Life Japan (PLJ), for every live birth in Japan there are three abortions, totaling more than five million per year.
In a report published in Japan Update, PLJ attributes the high abortion rate to several factors: scarcity of birth-control pills, the high cost of raising children, and the Buddhist practice of offering memorial rituals for parents of aborted fetuses.
Japanese law allows abortion through the twenty-third week of pregnancy. Also, a woman’s official family registration must record any children to whom she has given birth, even if those children are given up for adoption. Since such a record could mar the reputation of single women, abortion becomes an easier option.
Recently, a Christian physician was barred from medical practice for six months because he assisted a patient in putting her baby up for adoption, rather than perform an abortion. The case went to the Japanese supreme court, which ruled his behavior “violated medical ethics.”
COLOMBIA
Missing Missionary
Veteran missionary and Bible translator Bruce Olson was apparently kidnapped late in October by leftist guerrillas in Colombia. According to a report by International Media Service (IMS), the independent missionary and five Indian companions were ambushed in the “drug trafficking corridor” of Northern Colombia. It is unclear what prompted the incident.
In a prayer letter sent to the U.S. in late August, Olson said the Colombian army had warned him that he might be the target for some type of violence. “… I am in danger due to the imposing presence of guerrilla forces in … areas that I must pass through …,” he wrote.
The U.S. State Department is monitoring the situation, but is limited because the American-born missionary renounced his citizenship earlier this year. Olson’s situation is further complicated because he was not sent out by any particular denomination or mission group.
Olson has been working in Colombia since 1961, and has written a book, Bruchko, about his experiences. According to IMS, he has translated all of the New Testament and part of the Old Testament into the Motilone language, set up educational and medical facilities, and has spread the gospel to many unreached regions.
CHINA
Hudson Taylor’S Grave Found
For several years, the family of J. Hudson Taylor, pioneer missionary to China, has tried to find his place of burial. This past August, a Chinese pastor escorted Taylor’s greatgrandson, James H. Taylor III, to a former Protestant cemetery in Zhenjiang where the graves of Hudson Taylor, his first wife, and four of their children are intact.
The cemetery caretakers still live nearby. They told Taylor, currently general director of Overseas Missionary Fellowship, that in 1957 the gravestones were removed. Later in their visit, Taylor and his wife, Leone, discovered dismantled sections of Hudson Taylor’s monument behind the Zhenjiang Museum. Museum staff gave the Taylors rubbings of the engraved sections of the monument.
Authorities have asked the Taylors for a formal proposal to re-erect the monument.
PEOPLE AND EVENTS
Briefly Noted
Honored: For his 28 years of medical missionary service in Africa, Robert L. Foster. World Vision presented Foster, international director of the Africa Evangelical Fellowship, with the Robert W. Pierce Award for Outstanding Christian Service.
Announced: By population experts, that Asia may have just crossed the three billion population mark. China marked the occasion with speeches urging citizens to practice birth control.
By England’s oldest Anglican home missionary society, the Church Pastoral Aid Society, that retiring general secretary David Bubbers will be replaced by John Moore.
By archeologist James H. Charlesworth, “sensational, breathtaking” discoveries in Israel of the apostle Peter’s house in Capernaum where Jesus stayed.
