International Day of Persons with Disabilities: Raising voice for the voiceless, unborn babies

Muhammad Abbas Chatha and his entire family were very happy when they were informed by the gynaecologist that Mrs. Chatha was pregnant. Old parents of Mr. Chatha were especially happy as they had been waiting for the ‘good news’ for at least nine years. Chatha, a readymade garments shop owner in Allama Iqbal Town of Lahore, is the only son of his parents, and his house has never seen any toddler frocking around. Therefore, the news of a baby coming to the family made the couple and their parents overjoyed.

However, when Mrs. Chatha gave birth to a baby boy, the doctors involved in the process expressed their fears that the right side of the baby might not be working properly. The baby was born with some pre-birth defects, and the reason, stated by the doctors, was use of some medicines during pregnancy. The ill-effects of medication for diabetic condition of Mrs. Chatha during pregnancy started appearing on the newborn from the very first month of his life. The apparently healthy baby boy was unable to move his right arm and right leg properly. With the growing age of the child was increasing agony of the parents, who would ever recall that the expecting mother had never used any medicine without doctor’s prescription, then why that disability happened to the foetus. The parents had no answer, but a polymath arch-researcher Prof. Aurangzeb Hafi has a lot to tell the Chatha family and all concerned on the issue. He says there are teratogens, the substances, which are used in medicines as an ingredient, which are responsible for physical and chemical abnormalities during the embryonic stages.

Speaking at a function, organised in connection with the International Day of Persons with Disabilities, observed in Pakistan, like in other countries of the world, on Dec 3, 2021, he said that 120 medicines containing teratogens had been identified across the world. He says a ban has been placed on them in the United States, Sweden and other Scandinavian countries but, regrettably, in Pakistan and other developing countries, these medicines are still being prescribed and used without realising its lethal effects on the baby at the embryonic stages.

Dr. Hafi says he had prepared a list of about 380 medicines containing teratogens in his annotation conspectus inquiry titled 'Embryonic-Iatrogenesis Causality Annotation Broadsheet [EICAB]', which had been submitted to the United Nations for stressing the need to launch a forceful campaign in the developing countries to make legislation on the issue and raise awareness about its usage and its consequences.

The researcher says that disabilities among newborn as well as unborn babies are increasing at an alarming rate of 13.7 per cent across the world, for which awareness about the causes and legislation was direly needed in Pakistan. He believes “we will have to declare a war on teratogens, just like a war was declared on terrorism, to create awareness and stop the use of medicines containing teratogens”.

Dr. Aurangzeb Hafi says his research-based inquiry conspectus, which is going to directly impact over 687-796 million disabled persons of the world, quite systematically exposes the cover-stratums of pharmaceutical barbarianism.

The United Nations’ IDPD Observance of 2021 leaves an indelible mark on the entire history of scientific pursuit and the abundant discourse of research on the phenomenon of disability.

Prof Hafi wants all concerned to come forward and raise voice for those, who are unable to raise their voice for themselves — the babies, yet unborn, who are prone to severe life-long disabilities, like the newborn baby of the Chatha family. Dr Hafi says he has been raising voice for the voiceless for years, and hopes more voices will join his, to make it a movement so that the unborn could be saved from disabilities. -Dr Fatima Khan

The write is a physician by profession. She worked as an intern at the Capital Health (New Jersey) & the Mount Sinai St. Luke’s Hospital (New York). Rights and gender issues are the areas of special interest to her. She can be reached at: fatima23393@hotmail.com