On the Criminal “Abortion” of a 9-Month-Old Baby in Poland – When Abortion Doctors Hide Behind the Unlawful Guidelines of Donald Tusk’s Government

Adobe Stock

During Holy Week, when we remembered the martyrdom of Jesus, many Poles heard about the innocent death of 9-month-old Felek (such an altered name was given to him by Gazeta Wyborcza journalists). Potassium chloride – a substance used to carry out death sentences – was injected into the heart of the boy who was due to be born any day. This nightmare occurred in a public hospital in Oleśnica, funded by Polish taxpayers, and was a result of the Tusk government’s issuance of unlawful “abortion guidelines” in August 2024. As a result of these guidelines, bloody abortion has become a daily occurrence in Poland. We are mobilizing law enforcement agencies to prosecute abortionists, and we have also prepared a motion to the Constitutional Court, which should lead to the systemic exclusion of any possibility of killing children under any pretext in Polish hospitals.

A baby, nine months into pregnancy, was killed in Oleśnica.

Killing Felek was a race against time. This was confirmed by Deputy Health Minister Urszula Demkow, who stated plainly on Polsat Television that “this child would have been born alive. And that’s why, according to Polish law, neonatologists would have immediately proceeded to save this child. So the only way to prevent it from being born alive is to inject potassium chloride intracardially while the fetus is still in utero.”

Felek’s mother, whose doctors suspected congenital bone fragility, was offered an alternative at a hospital in Łódź: to terminate the pregnancy via cesarean section under full anesthesia, after which she could relinquish her parental rights. The baby was promised specialized medical attention and care after birth. The doctors knew they had no right to kill the baby. However, the mother preferred to rely on abortion activists. With their help, she killed her child in Oleśnica – in a hospital surrounded by the ominous reputation of being Poland’s largest abortion center. This is where abortion celebrity Gizela Jagielska works. In 2024 alone, 155 unborn children died in Oleśnica. Sixty-two of them were diagnosed with Down syndrome, and 13 were perfectly healthy.

For each of these abortions, the doctor should go to jail. Article 152 of the Polish Penal Code stipulates a penalty of up to three years in prison for performing illegal abortions, and following the 2020 Constitutional Court ruling, eugenic abortion is illegal in Poland.

Someone must answer for this murder.

Until now, law enforcement agencies have been passive in such cases. We will now do everything to ensure that little Felek’s sacrifice is not in vain, and that those guilty of this blood will be held accountable.

Paragraph 3 of the aforementioned Article 152 of the Polish Penal Code stipulates that whoever performs an abortion “when the conceived child has reached the capacity for independent life outside the pregnant woman’s organism, shall be punished by imprisonment from 6 months to 8 years.” What’s more, a child capable of living outside the mother’s body enjoys full protection under criminal law from the moment there are medical reasons for a cesarean section. Proceedings in this case have already been initiated by the Oleśnica District Prosecutor’s Office.

For abortionists to be held accountable, prosecutors and police must be constantly aware that every decision and action they take is being watched, and that any deference to the bloody abortion lobby will be exposed and stigmatized.

Lawyers at the Ordo Iuris Institute request that the criminal proceedings against Gizela Jagielska be placed under the supervision of the National Prosecutor’s Office and that the case be transferred from the District Prosecutor’s Office in Oleśnica to the Regional Prosecutor’s Office in Wrocław. We also demand that the Ombudsman for Patients’ Rights, the Ombudsman for Children’s Rights, and the Ombudsman for Civil Rights address the case. We will call on the National Health Fund to conduct an immediate inspection of the Oleśnica hospital.

Gizela Jagielska’s activities will also soon be evaluated by the Ombudsman for Professional Responsibility. We will monitor the case and provide the medical court with our legal opinion. We will also prepare proposals for parliamentary interpellations, which we will forward to parliamentarians ready to intervene in the case.

The Tusk government has blood on their hands. They are responsible for the death of innocent children.

However, nothing is more important than the permanent and systemic rejection of the government’s “abortion guidelines,” and unequivocally curbing the practice of unlawfully broad interpretations of the so-called “health premise” of abortion.

When, last year, the government announced the issuance of unlawful, unconstitutional “guidelines” instructing doctors to kill unborn children if a woman brought a certificate of “poor mental health,” we warned that doctors following these guidelines would be able to kill children even on the day before birth. This was indeed clear from the content of the “guidelines.” Today, it is clear that we were right.

A legal analysis prepared by Ordo Iuris has been sent to Polish hospitals, explaining to doctors, hospital directors, and prescribers that the guidelines contradict the laws that apply to doctors and simply must not be followed. Acting based on unlawful guidelines is a violation of the law, for which doctors will be held criminally responsible. No one can now hide behind ignorance.

READ ALSO: Ordo Iuris Documents Rule-of-Law Violations by the EU-Backed Polish Government

At the same time, we have also prepared a special, accessible guide for doctors in gynecology and obstetrics departments, explaining that they should not follow “guidelines” that do not change the existing law on the protection of life in the slightest. We also remind them that doctors are still legally obligated to save the lives of children before birth. Article 39 of the Polish Code of Medical Ethics states unequivocally that “when taking medical action in a pregnant woman, the doctor is simultaneously responsible for the health and life of the unborn child.” In the handbook, we also assured doctors and hospital authorities that if anyone tried to force them to perform illegal abortions, Ordo Iuris Institute lawyers would provide them with free legal assistance.

To dispel any doubts about the illegality of the government’s “guidelines,” we are seeking an unequivocal ruling from the Constitutional Court. To this end, we launched an online petition last year calling on President Andrzej Duda to refer the matter to the Constitutional Court. However, the President remained passive.

Therefore, we have now prepared a motion to the Constitutional Court to examine the constitutionality of the “guidelines,” which we will forward to Members of Parliament, as they are entitled to file such a motion. The motion also seeks a binding interpretation of abortion law by the Court that would rule out a broad interpretation of “health reasons” for abortion.

We have recently met with representatives of parties sitting in the Polish Sejm for this purpose. The MPs declared their readiness to cooperate. At the same time, we launched an online petition, appealing to MPs and the First President of the Supreme Court to submit our motion to the Constitutional Court.

How Ordo Iuris Defends the Life of the Unborn

These are only some of the actions we have taken in defense of life in recent weeks.

Before Christmas, we notified the Regional Prosecutor’s Office in Toruń about the activities of the Toruń Feminist Brigade, which reports on social media about abortionists who commit the crime of aiding and abetting abortion. In March, we filed a notice with the Regional Public Prosecutor’s Office in Warsaw regarding the Abortion Dream Team abortion clinic and specific abortion advice given by abortion activists openly in the media. The same prosecutor’s office also received our notice concerning Dr. Filip Dąbrowski – head of the Clinical Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Bielański Hospital in Warsaw – who openly brags about performing illegal abortions.

Although the prosecutor’s office is now controlled by Justice Minister Adam Bodnar, who supports abortionists, we believe that the obvious violations of the law will finally be punished.

READ ALSO: A year of devastation of the rule of law by the EU-supported Left in Poland

Thanks to our consistency, the first convictions for the deaths of unborn children have already been achieved.

In 2023, we obtained a conviction in the case of Justyna Wydrzyńska of the Abortion Dream Team (though the case will be retried, as the verdict was overturned by the appellate court after the change of government). Last month, there was a final verdict convicting a gynecologist who allegedly performed an illegal abortion while falsifying the patient’s medical records. Fortunately, the abortion did not take place. The doctor, however, was sentenced to one year’s imprisonment, suspended for three years. The Ordo Iuris Institute joined the proceedings at the appeal stage and called for the conviction to be upheld.

The defense of life from conception to natural death is one of the top priorities of all Ordo Iuris activities. Without the right to life, there are no other rights worth defending.

Defense of life is our common duty. I believe that, through the mobilization of defenders of life, we will prevail in the fight against the civilization of death, which is advancing across our homeland at an alarming pace.

Adv. Jerzy Kwaśniewski,
President of the Ordo Iuris Institute

*****

Additional commentary by Katarzyna Gęsiak,
Director of the Center for Medical Law and Bioethics at the Ordo Iuris Institute:

Widespread Criticism of Dr. Jagielska’s Act

It is worth noting that the outrage expressed against the conduct of the deputy director of the Oleśnica hospital has been joined by the Expert Team of the Polish Bishops’ Conference on Bioethics. Their position not only clearly emphasized universal values, such as respect for and protection of human life, but also stated that performing an abortion – that is, the intentional killing of a human being at the prenatal stage – is highly unethical. The attempt to justify it based on the mother’s mental health problems “is incompatible with facts and the concept of evidence-based medicine. There is no method of treating mental disorders by ‘termination of pregnancy,’” the Polish Catholic bishops have said. Their Expert Team also expressed concern about the increasing use of psychiatric opinions to justify and facilitate abortions on demand, even in cases where the fetus is fully developed and viable outside the womb.

Differing Ethnicity and Beliefs Do Not Exempt from the Law

In response to this criticism, Dr. Gizela Jagielska, who performed the abortion on the 9-month-old baby, defended herself in the Polish media by stating that she is Jewish and an atheist, and therefore does not share or respect Catholic values. However, this does not change the fact that, as a medical practitioner in the Republic of Poland, she is bound by Polish law and by the principles of the Code of Medical Ethics.

Worse still, the deputy director of the Oleśnica hospital went even further, expressing clear contempt for the Polish people—or more precisely, for its representatives who hold pro-life views—stating: “The stupidity that exists in this nation is a shock therapy to me.”

This case is extremely serious, and the conduct of this doctor is deeply scandalous. According to her professional calling, she should be committed first and foremost to the protection of human life and health (Article 2(1) of the Code of Medical Ethics). It is imperative that this case not be silenced by leftist and international media portraying the Oleśnica doctor as a victim of pro-life activists rather than the perpetrator of an outright murder of a defenseless human being.