pregnant bellyAn anesthetist working at an Australian abortion clinic has been charged with infecting dozens of patients with hepatitis C.

On purpose.

So much for "first do no harm."

Many of the women were there for late-term abortions, and the numbers include several women who traveled from New Zealand where abortion is only legal if "two certifying consultants agree that the pregnancy will seriously harm a woman's physical or mental health," and even then isn't used for third-trimester problems.

Croydon Day is the only clinic that will provide this service to women -- often women who have found their fetus has some serious abnormalities -- in the Victoria area.

The numbers of those infected keep increasing with testing on more women, but what remains a mystery is why Dr. James Latham Peters did this.

Hepatitis C attacks the liver and can lead to liver cancer. Unlike hepatitis A and B, there is no vaccine on the market for the disease, although there is treatment.

If Peters is a religious freak trying to make a point, he chose a disease laced with irony -- it's often sexually transmitted and can be passed from an infected pregnant woman to her child during childbirth.

Peters is a widower -- so he could also be angry that he'll have no more babies himself.

Then again, he's got a history of drug abuse. Maybe he's just crazy?

 

Image via Frank De Kleine/Flickr