Umbilical cord diameter. This diameter decreases rapidly within the placenta. The fully patent umbilical artery has two main layers: an outer layer consisting of circularly arranged smooth muscle cells and an inner layer which shows rather irregularly and loosely arranged cells embedded in abundant ground substance staining metachromatic. The smooth muscle cells of the layer are rather poorly differentiated, contain only a few tiny myofilaments and are thereby unlikely to contribute actively to the process of post-natal closure. The umbilical cord contains Wharton's jelly, a gelatinous substance made largely from mucopolysaccharides which protects the blood vessels inside. It contains one vein, which
Abortion in the United Kingdom declaring that "the restrictive abortion laws and practices and barriers to access safe abortion are gender-discriminatory, denying women and girls treatment only they need". Finally, Northern Ireland Justice Minister David Ford issued a call for public consultation on amending the criminal law on abortion. The call for consultation took into consideration cases where "there is a diagnosis in pregnancy that the foetus has a lethal abnormality". and cases where "women have become pregnant as a result of sexual crime". Ford also wrote that "it is not a debate on the wider issues of abortion law – issues often labelled as