from 6 weeks
Posted by: arasur on: January 16, 2008
1). Six Weeks:
A baby floats head-down in the tear-drop shaped amniotic sac, or bag of waters, which protects the rapidly developing embryo.
The picture shows a little boy removed from the fallopian tube of his mother’s womb at…… six weeks AFTER conception. The importance of the developing brain, is reflected in the size of the baby’s head in proportion to the rest of the body. Observe the budding arms, the dark area in the centre which is the liver and the umbilical cord threading its way through the neck of the ‘tear-drop’ to the chorion (afterbirth) in the hand at the top.
Conception or Fertilisation – the Beginning of Human Development – usually occurs in the fine tube which leads from the womb’s cavity to the ovary. The embryo or “conceptus” usually travels down the tube and implants in the womb. This child never completed the journey but lodged in the tube (the most common site of ectopic – literally “out of place” – pregnancy).
Doctors had to remove the tube containing the baby, because the growing child was about to rupture the tube, with fatal consequences for himself and potentially for the mother also. There is no moral objection to this treatment, which does not involve deliberately killing the embryo but is done to avert the threat to the mother’s life
2). 10-week baby:
The picture shows an unborn baby at 10 weeks after conception….. recognisably a member of the…… human family.
The baby measures 2 1/2 inches (61mm) from crown to rump (“sitting height”), and is growing at a rate of 1/2 inch (13mm) per week. The baby’s face, at first broad, now becomes narrower; the eyes are closed for protection from about 10 weeks until the sixth month. The sex of the baby can now be seen.
Nine weeks after conception …..the baby is well enough formed to bend his fingers round an object in the palm of his hand. In response to a touch on the sole of his foot he will curl his toes or bend his hips and knees to move away from the touching object. (“What the fetus feel”,by Valman and Pearson, British Medical Journal, 26 January 1980)
The baby will begin respond to touching on the skin by 6 weeks after conception, and by 12 weeks the range of responses is almost complete.
3). 11-week baby:
At 11 weeks after conception the fetus starts to swallow the surrounding amniotic fluid and to pass it back in his urine. He can also produce complex facial expressions and even ….. 
.
The baby is completely formed even though he fits snugly into the doctor’s hand. The ears were first distinguishable during the sixth week; the inner ear is completely formed in mid-pregnancy.
The baby is held in the hand of the late…. Professor Sir Albert William Liley, the pioneer of medical treatment for children in the womb. He has been called the Father of Foetology for his work, including the first successful blood transfusion on an unborn child (at around seven months’ gestation) in 1963.
Liley commented: “This situation highlights the fact that, in modern antenatal care, we are concerned with the welfare of two patients: the mother and the child.” (The Tiniest Humans, edited by R L Sassone, 1977, p.6.)
4). 16-week baby:
5). 21½-week baby:
Kelly Thorman….. was born prematurely in 1971 at 21½ weeks after conception. (This picture was taken three weeks later*).
Sadly, Kelly died of pneumonia (this is a particular danger with premature babies). When she died, nobody said that “part of the mother’s body” had gone or that “the products of conception” had disappeared.
So tiny!!
Kelly was “wanted” and given the best available care, while babies born alive in abortions who may have survived if given care have been left to die - although at this stage measures are often taken, and are recommended by the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (RCOG), to ensure the delivery of a dead baby.
With advances in technology and in understanding of human fetal development, premature babies’ chances of survival are improving. The RCOG stated in Preterm Labour and its Consequences (1985) that: “In 1984, 72 per cent of liveborn infants of 22 to 27 weeks’ gestation* born at the Bristol Maternity Hospital, (England) survived, as did 64 per cent of infants of 500 to 999 grammes birthweight.” These percentages had increased on those of previous years.
*Note: length of pregnancy is normally quoted from the time of the mother’s last menstrual period, rather than the age of the baby from conception, which would usually be two weeks less: i.e. 21.5 weeks after conception equates to 23.5 weeks pregnancy/gestation; 22-27 weeks gestation equates to 20-25 weeks from conception.
In terms of Ethical Issues and where Abortions are questionable…….maybe these Images of unborn babies > 21.5-week baby……….willl make a difference to our thinking. Are babies being killed or even “murdered”? The babies obviously feel touch and respond accordingly……and smile too. So tiny, yet a full developed human. One just has to look at the image of Kelly!!!! So tiny, yet unuble to survive due to weakness but with due medical care and love, chances of survival are there for other babies.
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