Behind Closed Doors by Natalie Fiennes;

Author:Natalie Fiennes;
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Publisher: Book Network Int'l Limited trading as NBN International (NBNi)

Abortion

After decades of campaigning, May 2018 saw the Irish people vote by a landslide to repeal the Eighth Amendment, a law that prohibited abortion in nearly all circumstances.

Abortion might have been illegal over all those years, but procedures still look place. Every year 2,000 women took illegal and unsafe pills to terminate pregnancy and eleven women travelled to mainland Britain every day to have an abortion, or be authorised by a clinician to take abortive medicines at home. Behind each statistic is a story. Some were survivors of rape or abuse, but others simply didn’t want to have a child.

Anti-abortion laws were at the heart of the most fundamental governing principles of the Irish nation. They were introduced in 1983, during a time when the Catholic Church and the Vatican were concerned about developments such as Roe vs. Wade and the legalisation of abortion around Europe. Ireland was held up as an example to the world where you could put anti-choice laws right into the beating heart of a nation’s identity.

The results of the 2018 referendum are seismic. More than 66 per cent of the Irish population gave a resounding ‘yes’ to repeal the Eighth Amendment. Ireland was the most recent country to make steps to legalise abortion, but there are still 26 countries around the world where it is illegal. There are also 37 other countries where abortion is only permitted when it’s necessary to save the life of the mother, and a further 36 countries restrict access unless an abortion is necessary to protect a mothers health.15

In the UK, one in three cis-women will have an abortion at some point in their lives. But what is the law surrounding it? Prior to the Abortion Act of 1967 in the UK, anyone seeking a termination would have to go before a committee and explain why they needed an abortion. Today, there are still limitations. Two doctors have to confirm that they meet the criteria laid out in the 1967 Abortion Act, including that ‘the termination is necessary to prevent grave permanent injury to the physical or mental health of the pregnant woman’. While there is a lot of progress, ‘because I don’t want to be pregnant’ or ‘there are other things I’d rather do with my life’ isn’t enough. Pro-choice campaigners say that it’s essential that people are given a decision to decide how their future will be. At many points in our lives, pregnancy is not possible or not preferred.

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