Sarah Palin Considered Aborting Downs Syndrome Son 'for a Fleeting Moment'

The former Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin has surprised campaigners on both sides of the bitter US abortion debate by revealing that she fleetingly considered a termination of her son Trig, who has Down's syndrome.

Addressing a "right to life" banquet in Indiana, the governor of Alaska revealed that she learned that her fifth child had a chromosome abnormality from test results while she was traveling during her pregnancy.

"There, just for a fleeting moment, I thought, I knew - nobody knows me here. Nobody would ever know," Palin said.

Avoiding use of the word "abortion", she said that for "a fleeting moment", she considered her options.

"I had to ask myself, 'Was I going to walk the walk or was I just going to talk the talk'," Palin told her audience. "It is easy to think maybe of trying to change the circumstances."

Palin's remarks, during her first political appearance outside Alaska since she served as John McCain's running mate, marked a change in tone for the strenuously anti-abortion politician and were greeted cautiously.

Elizabeth Shipp, political director of Naral Pro-Choice America, told the Washington Post: "If I didn't know any better, I'd say governor Palin sounds remarkably pro-choice."

During the election campaign, Palin's views became a contentious discussion point when she told CBS interviewer Katie Couric that she opposed the use of the "morning after" pill and that she would counsel against abortion even in a case of a 15-year-old girl who had been raped by her father.

David O'Steen, executive director of the National Right to Life Committee, told the Washington Post: "I think every one of us, every human being, has had it go through their mind, the possibility of an act they know is wrong - and then rejected."