If they really want to educate prospective parents by having them meet people with Down syndrome, they should have them meet Down syndrome adolescents and adults as well as small children, and see what kind of care and parenting is required later in life.

Down the street from my parents lives a boy a few years younger than me who has Down syndrome. I watched him grow up and watched his parents parent him, and it was clear that adolescence and adulthood present completely different challenges that you wouldn't necessarily anticipate after meeting a small child with Down syndrome.

"Pregnant women who have already decided to have amniocentesis are probably not, in general, lacking information about issues related to their pregnancy. I'm sure that, again in general, the people who are lacking information, who are uneducated about Down syndrome, are also not well informed about the tests for it or the options available to them after they get the results."

You've got to be kidding me. You really think that just knowing about amniocentesis and all sorts of other matters related to a pregnancy correlates with people who know everything about Down's Syndrome? We live in an ableist society where there are a host of misconceptions, stereotypes, myths, and prejudices against the disabled, and very obviously against people with Down's Syndrome. I can't think of anything better than actually SEEING with your eyes what the quality of life of a child with Down's Syndrome is really like. But you're actually arguing that people who've got the information they need about amniocentesis also know what they need to about Down's Syndrome -- as if being well-educated or having good access to health care means you automatically are immune to misinformation, ignorance, or stereotypes about the disabled?

I don't think this needs to be an either/or between respecting and understanding the lives of people with Down's Syndrome, and preserving reproductive freedom of choice. But your whole column seems to be devoted to pitching that as a "one way or the other" choice. Look -- these families are not forcing anyone to visit their homes. There's no legal coercion in effect. It's not remotely comparable to what anti-abortion activists do to women seeking abortion at clinics (again, often a very different population than we're talking about w/ amniocentesis). They're pressuring doctors, and they should be, not to treat an amniocentesis result that indicates Down's Syndrome like a flashing "defective" buzzer, but to make sure prospective parents have all the information they need to understand what a DS child's life would be like.

I think there are financial and psychological reasons why prospective parents of a DS child might choose to abort. But giving people access to more information, and not information of the sort that anti-abortion activists thrust in women's faces, is not a bad thing in this case.

In case you're wondering, I am not associated with this parents' group nor do I have a child with Down's Syndrome, but I read about this yesterday and today and I can't believe the unnecessary polarization that's going on, when we ought to be considering both a real ethics of reproductive rights and information, and the stigmatization and stereotypes that affect the disabled, even before birth.

If they really want to educate prospective parents by having them meet people with Down syndrome, they should have them meet Down syndrome adolescents and adults as well as small children, and see what kind of care and parenting is required later in life.

I agree wholeheartedly. When I worked at a grocery store in college, I had several co-workers with Downs. For the most part, working with them was no harder than dealing with other co-workers, but it gave me insight as to what it's like to deal with a person with the mental capacity of a 4 year old, but with the physical strength of an adult. It can actually be a little intimidating if you're a small person. This is NOT to say that I think that Downs folks are violent, but it's one thing trying to deal with a temper tantrum with someone who's 30 pounds, and another thing to deal with a tantrum of someone who outweighs you. If these parents really want to see what it's like, they should meet with the parents of grown Downs kids and talk to them about what to expect 20 or 30 years down the road.

If people wanted a pet, they'd get a dog, not keep a mentally defective child. That would be sick.

People who think others should be forced to care for defective children should expand their scope. How about forcing babies with defective hearts to forgo open heart surgery so their parents can experience the joys of raising them as blue babies? Or how about Siamese twins? Leave them connected! Let their parents share the joy of raising freaks!

These people are idiots.

When I was pregnant three years ago, my OB screened for cystic fibrosis and I learned that I was a carrier for the disease. I was immediately swept into a neonatalogist's office where we discussed the possibility of CVS and I was given a lot of information about cystic fibrosis and the kind of life a child would lead.

My husband and I had previously decided that if, for example, we were to find out that our child carried Down syndrome, we would abort. Well, that's all fine in theory, but when the baby you're actually carrying turns out to be involved, that's another story. During the two weeks where we waited for my husband's cystic fibrosis screen to come back, I back pedaled WAY the hell back from my previous assertion that I would want to abort.

While we waited, I spoke to several family members, including my mom, who are firmly entrenched in the medical field. We talked about cystic fibrosis, the research involved, CVS and amnios, the risks. It was all actually very clinical, my family did not wish at all to impose an opinion on me or try to sway me in one way or another.

Eventually we learned my husband was not a carrier, so there was no chance our child would have CF. We were lucky. My 26-month old is an active, adorable, perfect little punk... and not many days go by without me looking at him and realizing how lucky we were.

However, to have gone through something like what is proposed in this article -- to have other people try and impose their experience, their opinion, their morals and motivations on me... That would have made an already wrenching decision completely unbearable.

Being pregnant and the decision to have a baby is a personal journey. You begin to be a parent right then and there, and that means making decisions for you and your child that are sometimes difficult. Sometimes the decision not to have a baby is the best one you can make as a parent. No one else can answer those questions and to try and do so is unfair. Especially when some of the motivations are admittedly financial in relation to the desire to promote funding for research or other assistance programs. It would seem that there would be better outlets for these families if they desire to increase awareness of social issues related to Down syndrome. Trying to pressure pregnant women to have a baby at all, much less a baby with special needs, is inexcusable.

Thanks for this article. It illustrates perfectly the importance of the freedom of choice.