There is virtually no one in the modern world who supports the Holocaust. However, modern government-promulgated abortion of Down Syndrome babies in Denmark proves that the eugenics and euthanasia practices of 1940s Germany did not die with Hitler.
In 2004, Denmark (a welfare state whose medical industry is owned and operated by the national government) was the first country to introduce free first-trimester prenatal screening. The purpose of the screening was to identify disabilities, including Down Syndrome. Upon discovery of such a genetic disorder, expectant mothers are directed towards abortion by doctors.
Many supporters of this barbaric practice use the “mercy killing” argument, citing lack of productivity and success in life as justification for murder.
In fact, while the genetic condition is categorized as a disability, research shows that the majority of those with Down Syndrome lead happy, fulfilling lives. One study found that 96% liked how they looked, 97% liked who they were, and nearly 99% were happy with their lives, expressing love for their families.
Down Syndrome individuals continue to prove to the world that they do have the potential to accomplish a great deal with their lives.
In April 2024, Down Syndrome highschooler Kayla Kosmalski won Miss Teen Delaware after impressing judges with her academic and extracurricular achievements, including cheerleading, varsity swimming, and a 3.7 GPA. In one interview, she declared, “People with Down syndrome can do anything in their lives … Down Syndrome does not hold me back.”
Still, due to these screening procedures, only 18 Down Syndrome babies were born in Denmark in the year 2020.
Not surprisingly, many Danish Parents report feeling coerced and left with no other option but to abort when they receive a positive Down Syndrome diagnosis.
Of the few families brave enough to choose life, lack of community for these special families is a sad reality. Parents “very often believe that their child will spend his or her life without ever meeting another child with the same diagnosis.”
Through its pro-abortion legislation and weaponization of state healthcare, it is apparent that the Danish government sees children with Downs Syndrome as a medical liability at best, and a societal defect at worst. As a result, 99% of Danish Down Syndrome infants are aborted in the womb each year under governmental duress.
Legislation such as North Carolina HB 453 has been proposed to prevent this kind of barbarism here in the United States.
There is nothing new under the sun. The circumstances of this ever growing tragedy has been reflected over the course of history, most notably in the practices of the Nazi Regime.
In 1939, in pursuit of the “master race,” Adolf Hitler authorized the elimination of those his administration deemed useless to society. The Aktion T4 Program was a euthenasia-driven operation designed to produce a “better” society at the cost of hundreds of thousands of lives. Qualifications ranging from genetics, to infirmity, to economic productivity could all constitute “unworthiness” to live.
Those with physical disabilities were the most obvious target, and hospital staff were initially encouraged to neglect disabled Austrian and German citizens to the point of death. The Third Reich public health authorities also recommended that parents send their disabled children to special pediatric clinics, where the children were starved or given lethal injection.
Today, Danish children with Downs Syndrome are killed before they are even born.
Disability advocate Heidi Crowter sued the UK government in 2022 for similar laws. Like Denmark, the UK allows abortion up to birth for children with various minor disabilities such as cleft lip, clubfoot, and Down Syndrome, while maintaining a 24-week limit for regular abortions. Further, if an abortion fails, the child may be left without care until its death.
Crowter and her mother have promised to take their case to the European Court of Human rights, which may mean retribution for the greater Europe and beyond.
But why does this issue really matter?
Eugenics is a theory which claims that a population can be improved in some way by controlled breeding. Denmark’s practice of Down Syndrome abortion is a eugenicist practice, and further opens a side door to prenatal euthanasia.
Laws such as these, not unlike others in the West today, allow people to base the value of human life on the largely indeterminable genetic lottery.
We know that man is made in the image of God, and does not derive its value from any earthly being, but by the Creator of the universe.
It has not, is not, and will never be the right of one individual to decide if the life of another is worth living.
