45,

also be tyrannical, unethical and harmful. The raw deal that my patient received from a hospital board is a case in question. It is not unique.

Not long ago I witnessed another example of the inhuman act- ion of a hospital board in San Francisco.

A young woman came to me who was 21, married with two child- ren, one eighteen months, the other six months. Now she was preg- nant again and desperate over the prospect of another child. I had previously treated her for goiter and anemia. Laboratory tests showed she was again anemic. Besides, she was underweight and undernourished; her economic status was poor.

Furthermore, I found the patient emotionally so seriously disturbed, that I actually feared for her and her children's safety.

Therefore I referred the patient to a prominent gynecologist and, in a letter, gave him the above data, urgently suggesting a therapeutic abortion to preserve her and her family ".

The specialist examined her and fully agreed with me. Не wrote the second letter of certification that is required before such an operation can be performed.

The patient was admitted to the hospital, remained, several days under observation and naturally in a state of worry and sus- pense. Finally, the operation was scheduled for an early morning hour and all preparations were made. Now at last, the burden lifted from the young woman and once again there was a future. As she was of Catholic faith, a priest had visited her to make sure that she knew what she was doing and was satisfied to have this unwanted pregnancy interrupted. She was emphatic about it.

Half an hour before the time of the operation, she was suddenly and bluntly told that the Medical Board of the hospital had dis- approved of the operation and she was to go home and have her baby. Her and her husband's despair can easily be imagined. If funds had been available, a criminal abortion would undoubtedly have replaced the legitimate therapeutic one. But these people could not afford an abortionist's fee (although the wasted hospital expenses might have helped). Then, fate took a hand. Before a threatened desperate action could have been undertaken, the pat- ient had a miscarriage. Now medical science was ready to help.