Quito, Ecuador June 18, 2008
The Virgin de Panecillo revealed a banner with the text ?Safe abortion, 099004545. The number is from a hotline that will provide women with information about how they can do a safe abortion with pills themselves at home and other information related to sexual health.
The banner action was done by Women on Waves and Coordinadora Juvenil.
For pictures of the virgin with the banner and more information about the campaign see http://www.womenonwaves.org
Press information: +593 8 6966608 or +31 6 52052561
or email to press@womenonwaves.org
Thursday, June 19, 2008
Sunday, June 8, 2008
From The Sunday Business Post: The Morning-After Pill
08 June 2008
By Jennifer O'Connell
It's time Ireland accepted that its young women are not fools and made the morning-after pill available over the counter in pharmacies
I'm not pregnant. That's not a claim I've been able to make too often over the past two and a bit years.
And as long as I'm still buying nappies in two different sizes, the prospect is enough to induce in me the kind of trepidation normally only seen in the waiting room of the Well Woman Clinic the day after the Leaving Cert results come out.
Which is perhaps why I found myself feeling a stab of indignation at the realisation that the waiting room of the Well Woman Clinic remains the refuge of choice for those who find themselves in need of somememergency contraception with their croissant on a Sunday morning.
The Department of Health and the Health Service Executive are considering the question of whether it's time we caught up with muchof the rest of the world and made the morning-after pill available over the counter in pharmacies.
The department seems to have been considering this measure on and off since Sex was the name of a book by that upstart Madonna.
The latest recommendation is one of several contained in a report by the Pharmaceutical Society of Ireland. It's under review by Mary Harney's department, but there are, she says, ''major issues'' that will have to be considered first. And I think we all know what that
means.
The second-to-last time this proposal was raised - in 2006 - it was promptly shot down by the Irish Medical Organisation (IMO). The chairman of its GP committee said his members needed to be available to lecture women in need of emergency contraception on ''the
implications of being sexually active and how to protect against sexually transmitted diseases''. Oh, and to take their €50 consultation fee for the pleasure.
In 2008, it seems nonsensical that we still insist on making young women (and according to the IMO, the vast majority are in their teens or early 20s), anxious to take responsible action to prevent an unplanned pregnancy, wait until their GP can squeeze them in on Tuesday at 11. That's if they're brave enough to see their family GP, and can afford the consultation fee.
And that's presuming they have a GP in the first place - what student living away from home does?
There is, of course, a need to ensure that anyone getting emergency contraception understands it is just that. But surely you don't need a medical degree in order to impart to teenagers the real risks of having sex without protection? I'd have thought a pharmacist was every bit as qualified to do this.
Just think about the mixed messages we are giving here to our teenagers and twentysomethings. We feed them an endless diet of sexually provocative imagery on TV and in magazines. We buy them clothes emblazoned with the Playboy logo. We manufacture alcoholic
drinks in friendly little fruit flavours.
We force them through one of the most high-pressure education systems in Europe and, when they finally come out the other end, we drop them off at discos to celebrate, wearing low-cut tops and with something akin to Paris Hilton's hairband around their waists.
Then, in case all this hothousing and pressure and alcohol conspire to have the expected effect, we make it extremely difficult for them to get the morning-after pill, because we really don't want them waiting until they've finished their education and made a decent start in life before getting on with making babies.
At least, I think that's the idea. There are two things that matter about emergency contraception. The first is that it is available in emergencies, when other methods have failed, or haven't been given the chance to work.
Such emergencies, I would venture, usually don't arise on a weekday between the hours of 9am and 5pm. The second thing is that it works for up to 72 hours after intercourse, but it is more effective the earlier it is taken. A 1998 WHO study found that it worked best in the first 12 hours after sex. After that, its effectiveness declines by the hour.
It seems like a particularly Irish solution to license the morning-after pill, but only to make it available through GPs' surgeries, and by extension to diminish its ability to prevent pregnancy.
Let's not get into Irish solutions to family planning problems: the emergency contraceptive pill does not need to get mixed up with the abortion debate. But, since we're on the subject, let me just set the record straight.
The morning-after pill works in three different ways, depending on the time of the cycle and when it is taken: it delays ovulation, alters the transport of sperm along the womb and, in case all else fails, alters the lining of the womb so as to prevent implantation of a fertilised egg – a bit like a combination of the normal pill and the IUD.
Medically and legally, it is not an abortifacient because it acts before implantation. In fact, several studies have shown that the morning-after pill works to reduce abortion rates - including one that attributed half the 11 per cent decline in the abortion rate in the US to the availability of the morning-after pill.
Aside from the ethical issues it has become tangled up with, those opposed to making it available over the counter (coincidentally, in a recent survey, they were the demographic least likely to ever find themselves frantically searching for it: namely the over-50s) appear to feel that if they made it too easy, we silly girls would just keep popping morning-after pills instead of abstaining or organising proper contraception.
Because, of course, who'd want to go to all that trouble when they have available to them a more expensive, less reliable hormone solution that offers the giddying prospect of making them vomit their guts up instead?
The morning-after pill is now available over the counter in 44 countries, including the US, where individual pharmacists have an ethical opt-out.
A recommendation from the Council of Europe that all member states make it available in this way has been adopted in France, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Portugal, Sweden, Switzerland and Britain.
In most of these countries, it is classed as a 'non-prescription' drug, which means it is still subject to significant restrictions and usually only available following a consultation with the pharmacist.
According to the British Medical Journal, there has been no increase in its use, and no decline in the use of other forms of contraception since it went on sale without prescription. This suggests that women are continuing to use it as they always have: sensibly and
judiciously. Because to use it otherwise, surely, is not to use it at all.
As long as there are men and women, as long as there are hormones and alcohol, there will be moments of unplanned and unwise passion.
There may even be quite a few of them later this month, when 50,000 students emerge from the fog of the Leaving Cert bristling with pent-up energy and in urgent need of ways to release it.
Of course, we would prefer them not to, and if they really must, we would prefer that they used safer barrier methods of contraception that also offer protection against STDs. But this is the real world, and in the real world, who benefits from us making it more difficult for them to avoid an unplanned pregnancy?
By Jennifer O'Connell
It's time Ireland accepted that its young women are not fools and made the morning-after pill available over the counter in pharmacies
I'm not pregnant. That's not a claim I've been able to make too often over the past two and a bit years.
And as long as I'm still buying nappies in two different sizes, the prospect is enough to induce in me the kind of trepidation normally only seen in the waiting room of the Well Woman Clinic the day after the Leaving Cert results come out.
Which is perhaps why I found myself feeling a stab of indignation at the realisation that the waiting room of the Well Woman Clinic remains the refuge of choice for those who find themselves in need of somememergency contraception with their croissant on a Sunday morning.
The Department of Health and the Health Service Executive are considering the question of whether it's time we caught up with muchof the rest of the world and made the morning-after pill available over the counter in pharmacies.
The department seems to have been considering this measure on and off since Sex was the name of a book by that upstart Madonna.
The latest recommendation is one of several contained in a report by the Pharmaceutical Society of Ireland. It's under review by Mary Harney's department, but there are, she says, ''major issues'' that will have to be considered first. And I think we all know what that
means.
The second-to-last time this proposal was raised - in 2006 - it was promptly shot down by the Irish Medical Organisation (IMO). The chairman of its GP committee said his members needed to be available to lecture women in need of emergency contraception on ''the
implications of being sexually active and how to protect against sexually transmitted diseases''. Oh, and to take their €50 consultation fee for the pleasure.
In 2008, it seems nonsensical that we still insist on making young women (and according to the IMO, the vast majority are in their teens or early 20s), anxious to take responsible action to prevent an unplanned pregnancy, wait until their GP can squeeze them in on Tuesday at 11. That's if they're brave enough to see their family GP, and can afford the consultation fee.
And that's presuming they have a GP in the first place - what student living away from home does?
There is, of course, a need to ensure that anyone getting emergency contraception understands it is just that. But surely you don't need a medical degree in order to impart to teenagers the real risks of having sex without protection? I'd have thought a pharmacist was every bit as qualified to do this.
Just think about the mixed messages we are giving here to our teenagers and twentysomethings. We feed them an endless diet of sexually provocative imagery on TV and in magazines. We buy them clothes emblazoned with the Playboy logo. We manufacture alcoholic
drinks in friendly little fruit flavours.
We force them through one of the most high-pressure education systems in Europe and, when they finally come out the other end, we drop them off at discos to celebrate, wearing low-cut tops and with something akin to Paris Hilton's hairband around their waists.
Then, in case all this hothousing and pressure and alcohol conspire to have the expected effect, we make it extremely difficult for them to get the morning-after pill, because we really don't want them waiting until they've finished their education and made a decent start in life before getting on with making babies.
At least, I think that's the idea. There are two things that matter about emergency contraception. The first is that it is available in emergencies, when other methods have failed, or haven't been given the chance to work.
Such emergencies, I would venture, usually don't arise on a weekday between the hours of 9am and 5pm. The second thing is that it works for up to 72 hours after intercourse, but it is more effective the earlier it is taken. A 1998 WHO study found that it worked best in the first 12 hours after sex. After that, its effectiveness declines by the hour.
It seems like a particularly Irish solution to license the morning-after pill, but only to make it available through GPs' surgeries, and by extension to diminish its ability to prevent pregnancy.
Let's not get into Irish solutions to family planning problems: the emergency contraceptive pill does not need to get mixed up with the abortion debate. But, since we're on the subject, let me just set the record straight.
The morning-after pill works in three different ways, depending on the time of the cycle and when it is taken: it delays ovulation, alters the transport of sperm along the womb and, in case all else fails, alters the lining of the womb so as to prevent implantation of a fertilised egg – a bit like a combination of the normal pill and the IUD.
Medically and legally, it is not an abortifacient because it acts before implantation. In fact, several studies have shown that the morning-after pill works to reduce abortion rates - including one that attributed half the 11 per cent decline in the abortion rate in the US to the availability of the morning-after pill.
Aside from the ethical issues it has become tangled up with, those opposed to making it available over the counter (coincidentally, in a recent survey, they were the demographic least likely to ever find themselves frantically searching for it: namely the over-50s) appear to feel that if they made it too easy, we silly girls would just keep popping morning-after pills instead of abstaining or organising proper contraception.
Because, of course, who'd want to go to all that trouble when they have available to them a more expensive, less reliable hormone solution that offers the giddying prospect of making them vomit their guts up instead?
The morning-after pill is now available over the counter in 44 countries, including the US, where individual pharmacists have an ethical opt-out.
A recommendation from the Council of Europe that all member states make it available in this way has been adopted in France, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Portugal, Sweden, Switzerland and Britain.
In most of these countries, it is classed as a 'non-prescription' drug, which means it is still subject to significant restrictions and usually only available following a consultation with the pharmacist.
According to the British Medical Journal, there has been no increase in its use, and no decline in the use of other forms of contraception since it went on sale without prescription. This suggests that women are continuing to use it as they always have: sensibly and
judiciously. Because to use it otherwise, surely, is not to use it at all.
As long as there are men and women, as long as there are hormones and alcohol, there will be moments of unplanned and unwise passion.
There may even be quite a few of them later this month, when 50,000 students emerge from the fog of the Leaving Cert bristling with pent-up energy and in urgent need of ways to release it.
Of course, we would prefer them not to, and if they really must, we would prefer that they used safer barrier methods of contraception that also offer protection against STDs. But this is the real world, and in the real world, who benefits from us making it more difficult for them to avoid an unplanned pregnancy?
Wednesday, June 4, 2008
Repairing the Damage, Before Roe
With the Supreme Court becoming more conservative, many people who support women’s right to choose an abortion fear that Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision that gave them that right, is in danger of being swept aside.
When such fears arise, we often hear about the pre-Roe “bad old days.” Yet there are few physicians today who can relate to them from personal experience. I can.
I am a retired gynecologist, in my mid-80s. My early formal training in my specialty was spent in New York City, from 1948 to 1953, in two of the city’s large municipal hospitals.
There I saw and treated almost every complication of illegal abortion that one could conjure, done either by the patient herself or by an abortionist — often unknowing, unskilled and probably uncaring. Yet the patient never told us who did the work, or where and under what conditions it was performed. She was in dire need of our help to complete the process or, as frequently was the case, to correct what damage might have been done.
The patient also did not explain why she had attempted the abortion, and we did not ask. This was a decision she made for herself, and the reasons were hers alone. Yet this much was clear: The woman had put herself at total risk, and literally did not know whether she would live or die.
This, too, was clear: Her desperate need to terminate a pregnancy was the driving force behind the selection of any method available.
The familiar symbol of illegal abortion is the infamous “coat hanger” — which may be the symbol, but is in no way a myth. In my years in New York, several women arrived with a hanger still in place. Whoever put it in — perhaps the patient herself — found it trapped in the cervix and could not remove it.
We did not have ultrasound, CT scans or any of the now accepted radiology techniques. The woman was placed under anesthesia, and as we removed the metal piece we held our breath, because we could not tell whether the hanger had gone through the uterus into the abdominal cavity. Fortunately, in the cases I saw, it had not.
However, not simply coat hangers were used.
Almost any implement you can imagine had been and was used to start an abortion — darning needles, crochet hooks, cut-glass salt shakers, soda bottles, sometimes intact, sometimes with the top broken off.
Another method that I did not encounter, but heard about from colleagues in other hospitals, was a soap solution forced through the cervical canal with a syringe. This could cause almost immediate death if a bubble in the solution entered a blood vessel and was transported to the heart.
The worst case I saw, and one I hope no one else will ever have to face, was that of a nurse who was admitted with what looked like a partly delivered umbilical cord. Yet as soon as we examined her, we realized that what we thought was the cord was in fact part of her intestine, which had been hooked and torn by whatever implement had been used in the abortion. It took six hours of surgery to remove the infected uterus and ovaries and repair the part of the bowel that was still functional.
It is important to remember that Roe v. Wade did not mean that abortions could be performed. They have always been done, dating from ancient Greek days.
What Roe said was that ending a pregnancy could be carried out by medical personnel, in a medically accepted setting, thus conferring on women, finally, the full rights of first-class citizens — and freeing their doctors to treat them as such.
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
BBC News: MPs Back 24-Week Abortion Limit
Attempts to cut the upper limit for abortions from 24 to 22 weeks have been rejected by MPs after a free vote.
Tory MP Nadine Dorries, a former nurse who proposed a 20-week limit, said: "There comes a point when it has to be said this baby has a right to life." But her plan was defeated by 332 votes to 190. A move to bring in a 22-week limit was opposed by 304 votes to 233.
Pro-choice campaigners said there was no scientific evidence to justify a cut in the limit. Government figures showed 193,737 women in England and Wales had an abortion in 2006.
In modern Britain the most dangerous place to be is in your mother's womb. It should be a place of sanctity. Edward Leigh, Conservative MP
The votes followed two impassioned debates on the controversial Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill - the biggest shake-up of fertility law for nearly 20 years. Earlier the government saw off another challenge to the bill when MPs rejected a cross-party move for doctors to consider the need for a "father and a mother" before allowing IVF treatment.
Before the abortion debate, Gordon Brown said he would vote for the status quo but Conservative leader David Cameron said he favoured lowering the limit to 22 weeks.
'No evidence'
Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg was also expected to vote against a reduction. Health Minister Dawn Primarolo insisted there was no evidence requiring the abortion laws to be changed. She said: "The upper gestational limit for termination of pregnancy was set by Parliament in 1990 at 24 weeks because the scientific evidence of the time was that the threshold of viability had increased and babies were increasingly surviving at 24 weeks and above. "That was the case in 1990 and it's certainly the case now."
But, David Jones, a professor of bio-ethics, said research on the survival rates for extremely premature babies was "disputed". Mrs Dorries said she believed the right of a woman to choose had its limits. She said she reached this decision after seeing the "botched" abortion of a baby boy when she was a gynaecological nurse. "I believe a baby has rights. Those rights kick in if that baby were born it would have a chance of life and if it feels pain as part of the abortion," she said.
'Protect the vulnerable' Ex-minister Edward Leigh, a father-of-six, who pressed for a 12-week limit, said it would bring Britain into line with the rest of Europe.
ENGLAND AND WALES ABORTIONS
Under 9 weeks: 54.9%
9-12 weeks: 34.3%
13-19 weeks: 9.2%
20-24 weeks: 1.5%
ONS figures from 2006
"In modern Britain the most dangerous place to be is in your mother's womb. It should be a place of sanctity," he said. He said "98% of abortions are social - only 1.3% are for foetuses which are handicapped, 0.4% are for risk to mother's life" and added: "It is a bleak picture of modern Britain ...I believe we should give that silent child a voice."
Labour's Claire Curtis-Thomas said she was not opposed to abortion, believing women had the right to choose. But she added: "I can't accept that we keep the limit where it stands where there is a possibility of life. The majority of people are deeply uncomfortable with that prospect."
'Misconception'
Labour's Chris McCafferty said restricting when a woman could have a termination "is just prolonging the agony" and was "cruel, cynical, ill-informed and inhumane". "It's a basic misconception that women with an unwanted pregnancy should only enter into the actual decision-making process after counselling with someone they do not know," she said.
HAVE YOUR SAY
This is about a woman having the right to choose what happens to her body Leana, Shropshire Lib Dem
Dr John Pugh said: "There are people in our world today in no way inferior to us in capacity, intelligence and beauty who were born at 22 weeks. That ought to give us cause for reflection."
Earlier a bid to cut the limit to 12 weeks was opposed by 393 votes to 71. A further attempt to get the limit down to 16 weeks was defeated by 387 votes to 84. On Monday night a cross-party attempt to ban hybrid animal embryos was defeated, and a bid to ban "saviour siblings" was voted down by 342 votes to 163.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/uk_news/politics/7409696.stm
Published: 2008/05/20 22:59:11 GMT
Tory MP Nadine Dorries, a former nurse who proposed a 20-week limit, said: "There comes a point when it has to be said this baby has a right to life." But her plan was defeated by 332 votes to 190. A move to bring in a 22-week limit was opposed by 304 votes to 233.
Pro-choice campaigners said there was no scientific evidence to justify a cut in the limit. Government figures showed 193,737 women in England and Wales had an abortion in 2006.
In modern Britain the most dangerous place to be is in your mother's womb. It should be a place of sanctity. Edward Leigh, Conservative MP
The votes followed two impassioned debates on the controversial Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill - the biggest shake-up of fertility law for nearly 20 years. Earlier the government saw off another challenge to the bill when MPs rejected a cross-party move for doctors to consider the need for a "father and a mother" before allowing IVF treatment.
Before the abortion debate, Gordon Brown said he would vote for the status quo but Conservative leader David Cameron said he favoured lowering the limit to 22 weeks.
'No evidence'
Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg was also expected to vote against a reduction. Health Minister Dawn Primarolo insisted there was no evidence requiring the abortion laws to be changed. She said: "The upper gestational limit for termination of pregnancy was set by Parliament in 1990 at 24 weeks because the scientific evidence of the time was that the threshold of viability had increased and babies were increasingly surviving at 24 weeks and above. "That was the case in 1990 and it's certainly the case now."
But, David Jones, a professor of bio-ethics, said research on the survival rates for extremely premature babies was "disputed". Mrs Dorries said she believed the right of a woman to choose had its limits. She said she reached this decision after seeing the "botched" abortion of a baby boy when she was a gynaecological nurse. "I believe a baby has rights. Those rights kick in if that baby were born it would have a chance of life and if it feels pain as part of the abortion," she said.
'Protect the vulnerable' Ex-minister Edward Leigh, a father-of-six, who pressed for a 12-week limit, said it would bring Britain into line with the rest of Europe.
ENGLAND AND WALES ABORTIONS
Under 9 weeks: 54.9%
9-12 weeks: 34.3%
13-19 weeks: 9.2%
20-24 weeks: 1.5%
ONS figures from 2006
"In modern Britain the most dangerous place to be is in your mother's womb. It should be a place of sanctity," he said. He said "98% of abortions are social - only 1.3% are for foetuses which are handicapped, 0.4% are for risk to mother's life" and added: "It is a bleak picture of modern Britain ...I believe we should give that silent child a voice."
Labour's Claire Curtis-Thomas said she was not opposed to abortion, believing women had the right to choose. But she added: "I can't accept that we keep the limit where it stands where there is a possibility of life. The majority of people are deeply uncomfortable with that prospect."
'Misconception'
Labour's Chris McCafferty said restricting when a woman could have a termination "is just prolonging the agony" and was "cruel, cynical, ill-informed and inhumane". "It's a basic misconception that women with an unwanted pregnancy should only enter into the actual decision-making process after counselling with someone they do not know," she said.
HAVE YOUR SAY
This is about a woman having the right to choose what happens to her body Leana, Shropshire Lib Dem
Dr John Pugh said: "There are people in our world today in no way inferior to us in capacity, intelligence and beauty who were born at 22 weeks. That ought to give us cause for reflection."
Earlier a bid to cut the limit to 12 weeks was opposed by 393 votes to 71. A further attempt to get the limit down to 16 weeks was defeated by 387 votes to 84. On Monday night a cross-party attempt to ban hybrid animal embryos was defeated, and a bid to ban "saviour siblings" was voted down by 342 votes to 163.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/uk_news/politics/7409696.stm
Published: 2008/05/20 22:59:11 GMT
GPs and the Silence Around Abortion
From Indymedia Ireland:
Doctors For Choice was set up in 2002 by doctors, mainly GPs, who want to contribute to ending the silence around abortion in Ireland. In a new article, published in the current (May) edition of Forum magazine (a publication for GPs in Ireland), a member of Doctors For Choice looks at the issue of silence around abortion and general practice in Ireland today. Click here for PDF.
Thursday, May 15, 2008
Some Links For Information on the Lisbon Treaty
Taken from the Irish Examiner 15th May 2008:
* www.lisbontreaty2008.ie (neutral site by the Referendum Commission).
* www.rte.ie/lisbon (neutral site showcasing the views of pro and anti-treaty campaigners).
* www.vote4europe.ie (pro-treaty site by Fianna Fáil).
* www.finegael.ie (links to reasons for a yes vote).
* www.labour.ie/lisbonreformtreaty (pro-treaty).
* www.lisbonvote.com (anti-treaty site by Coir).
* www.libertas.org (anti-treaty).
* www.no2lisbon.ie (anti-treaty site linked to Sinn Féin).
* www.europarl.ie (site contains views on the treaty from various sitting MEPs)
* www.lisbontreaty2008.ie (neutral site by the Referendum Commission).
* www.rte.ie/lisbon (neutral site showcasing the views of pro and anti-treaty campaigners).
* www.vote4europe.ie (pro-treaty site by Fianna Fáil).
* www.finegael.ie (links to reasons for a yes vote).
* www.labour.ie/lisbonreformtreaty (pro-treaty).
* www.lisbonvote.com (anti-treaty site by Coir).
* www.libertas.org (anti-treaty).
* www.no2lisbon.ie (anti-treaty site linked to Sinn Féin).
* www.europarl.ie (site contains views on the treaty from various sitting MEPs)
Monday, May 12, 2008
Letter to British MPs Against Reducing Timelimits
Open Letter to Members of Parliament
House of Commons
London SW1A 1AA
16 May 2008
Dear Member of Parliament,
I write on behalf of the members of Voice for Choice and the
undersigned organizations with an urgent request for your support on
an issue of great importance to women, especially young women.
As you may know, some Members of Parliament and the anti-abortion
lobby groups have announced their intentions to put amendments to the
1967 Abortion Act so as to make abortion harder for women to access.
These efforts, to be made via the Human Fertilisation and Embryology
Bill, are particularly aimed at lowering the abortion time limit to
under 24 weeks of pregnancy, for all grounds for abortion.
Only 1.45% of all abortions in this country take place at 20–24 weeks
of pregnancy. Why are these abortions late? Some women experience
delays in referral. Some learn of serious fetal abnormality. For most,
the reasons are: not realising they are pregnant, uncertainty about
what to do, continuing bleeding that they think is their period, fear
of parents' or partner's reaction, denial that they are pregnant,
serious changes in personal circumstances, problems such as domestic
violence, and not knowing where to seek help. These women are
disproportionately likely to be adolescents or other vulnerable women.
Lowering the legal time limit for abortion would certainly punish the
women who could no longer access a safe abortion at 20–24 weeks of
pregnancy, but it would not reduce the need for late abortions, a need
which has been shown to exist across Europe and in almost every
country in the world. In countries where the upper time limit for
abortion is lower than in Britain, women are forced to travel abroad
for abortion care or seek illegal services at great emotional and
financial cost. We call on you to prevent this hardship being imposed
on women here.
The proposed anti-abortion amendment is largely based on claims of
changes to fetal viability. However, even for those who believe that
women's rights to abortion should be linked to the gestational age at
which extremely premature babies can survive, the medical and
scientific evidence from the recently published Epicure II study and
other research is unequivocal. The findings show that survival rates
below 24 weeks of pregnancy have not improved since the Abortion Act
was last amended in 1990.
The UK Government, House of Commons Science and Technology Committee,
and medical, nursing and scientific professional bodies have examined
the evidence, and all agree that there is no compelling evidence to
support lowering the abortion time limit.
Please support women in the UK by voting in support of the current
legal time limit on abortion.
House of Commons
London SW1A 1AA
16 May 2008
Dear Member of Parliament,
I write on behalf of the members of Voice for Choice and the
undersigned organizations with an urgent request for your support on
an issue of great importance to women, especially young women.
As you may know, some Members of Parliament and the anti-abortion
lobby groups have announced their intentions to put amendments to the
1967 Abortion Act so as to make abortion harder for women to access.
These efforts, to be made via the Human Fertilisation and Embryology
Bill, are particularly aimed at lowering the abortion time limit to
under 24 weeks of pregnancy, for all grounds for abortion.
Only 1.45% of all abortions in this country take place at 20–24 weeks
of pregnancy. Why are these abortions late? Some women experience
delays in referral. Some learn of serious fetal abnormality. For most,
the reasons are: not realising they are pregnant, uncertainty about
what to do, continuing bleeding that they think is their period, fear
of parents' or partner's reaction, denial that they are pregnant,
serious changes in personal circumstances, problems such as domestic
violence, and not knowing where to seek help. These women are
disproportionately likely to be adolescents or other vulnerable women.
Lowering the legal time limit for abortion would certainly punish the
women who could no longer access a safe abortion at 20–24 weeks of
pregnancy, but it would not reduce the need for late abortions, a need
which has been shown to exist across Europe and in almost every
country in the world. In countries where the upper time limit for
abortion is lower than in Britain, women are forced to travel abroad
for abortion care or seek illegal services at great emotional and
financial cost. We call on you to prevent this hardship being imposed
on women here.
The proposed anti-abortion amendment is largely based on claims of
changes to fetal viability. However, even for those who believe that
women's rights to abortion should be linked to the gestational age at
which extremely premature babies can survive, the medical and
scientific evidence from the recently published Epicure II study and
other research is unequivocal. The findings show that survival rates
below 24 weeks of pregnancy have not improved since the Abortion Act
was last amended in 1990.
The UK Government, House of Commons Science and Technology Committee,
and medical, nursing and scientific professional bodies have examined
the evidence, and all agree that there is no compelling evidence to
support lowering the abortion time limit.
Please support women in the UK by voting in support of the current
legal time limit on abortion.
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