Grieving parents can register miscarriages

French now recognises human embryos as legal persons following a decision by
the Cour de Cassation, France’s highest appeals court. It ruled that three
couples could register their miscarried foetuses to enable them to give them an
official burial. Until now a foetus had to be viable before it could be
registered — older than 22 weeks of pregnancy or weighing more than 500 grams.
The decision has been cheered by French Catholics, who believe human life begins
at the moment of conception. "The Church’s position is that we must act as if
the embryo were a person," said the Archbishop of Paris, Cardinal André
Vingt-Trois. "This means that a foetus has a status." However, the ruling will
probably not affect the status of legal abortion in France, although abortion
rights advocate Marie-Francoise Colombani, a columnist for the women’s magazine
Elle, said the court had opened a Pandora’s box by trying to accommodate
grieving parents. ~ Reuters, Feb 19