Things have to change: New Brunswick can no longer ignore its responsibility with regards to abortion access

by Regroupement féministe du Nouveau-Brunswick.
February 2, 2024

Regroupement féministe du Nouveau-Brunswick (RFNB) is devastated to learn of the definitive closure of Fredericton’s Clinic 554. Yesterday, outside the New Brunswick Legislature, Dr. Adrian Edgar announced that, due to the doubling of the clinic’s rent and the lack of public funding, his team would no longer be able to provide abortion services, effective immediately. In addition to an entire region being denied access to essential health care, this event highlights the current government’s misogynistic and classist legislation.

We call on all New Brunswick politicians to take responsibility for guaranteeing universal, free, safe and bilingual access to abortion care for all pregnant people! Things have to change.

Continued: https://nbmediacoop.org/2024/02/02/things-have-to-change-new-brunswick-can-no-longer-ignore-its-responsibility-with-regards-to-abortion-access-commentary/

Clinic 554 to close, bringing clinic-based abortions to end in Fredericton area

Dr. Adrian Edgar says pro-bono work, increased rent costs are forcing immediate closure of clinic

Aidan Cox · CBC News
Jan 31, 2024

A Fredericton clinic that provides surgical abortions will be closing its doors after Wednesday, with its medical director blaming an unwillingness by the provincial government to allow the procedure to be covered by Medicare.

Dr. Adrian Edgar, the clinic's medical director, announced in 2019 he was being forced to close Clinic 554 over financial pressures incurred from providing pro-bono abortion procedures to women who can't afford to pay for them out of pocket.

On Wednesday, Edgar said the clinic, which has been operating one day a week, will now close completely because of the continuing financial strain from providing the procedure free of charge, and a rent increase at Brunswick Street building that houses the clinic.

Continued: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/new-brunswick/clinic-554-fredericton-abortion-1.7100433

Canada – Clinic 554, Fredericton Abortion Clinic That Also Supports LGBTQ Patients, Set To Close

Clinic 554, Fredericton Abortion Clinic That Also Supports LGBTQ Patients, Set To Close
The clinic's director, along with Jagmeet Singh, want the federal government to intervene.

10/11/2019
By Maija Kappler

New Brunswick’s only freestanding abortion clinic, which also provides health care to much of the province’s transgender population, is set to close.

Clinic 554 has previously relied on crowdsourced donations to stay open, and the staff sometimes forgoes payment from patients in order to provide services.

“We feel a tremendous amount of fear for our patients and the underserved communities we care for,” Clinic 554’s medical director, Dr. Adrian Edgar, said in an emotional statement posted to Facebook. “I thought I would be the family doctor for my patients until I or they died.”

Continued: https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/abortion-clinic-closure-new-brunswick_ca_5d9fa05de4b087efdbab11c0?utm_hp_ref=ca-living

New Brunswick Health Minister is “willfully incompetent” says doctor

New Brunswick Health Minister is “willfully incompetent” says doctor

Written by Susan O'Donnell
on August 16, 2019

Health Minister and lawyer Ted Flemming knowingly permits New Brunswick to contravene the Canada Health Act, the federal law regulating payment of health services. New Brunswick doctor Adrian Edgar says this indicates Flemming is “willfully incompetent” and has called for his resignation.

The Canada Health Act ensures that eligible Canadian residents can access health services approved by Medicare on a prepaid basis, without direct charges at the point of service. Most doctors across Canada operate from private facilities, billing their provincial government for Medicare services. In New Brunswick, the province pays for all Medicare services provided by doctors in private facilities, except abortions.

Continued: http://nbmediacoop.org/2019/08/16/new-brunswick-health-minister-is-willfully-incompetent-says-doctor/

What it was like to fight at an illegal abortion clinic in Toronto during the 1980s

What it was like to fight at an illegal abortion clinic in Toronto during the 1980s
Excerpted from Judy Rebick's new book, Heroes in my Head

June 13, 2018
Judy Rebick

On June 15, 1983, Dr. Henry Morgentaler opened an illegal abortion clinic in Toronto. The Ontario Coalition for Abortion Clinics (OCAC) had chosen a spot on the second floor of a lovely Victorian house on Harbord Street, a quiet downtown thoroughfare lined with bookstores and cafés near the University of Toronto. With the Toronto Women’s Bookstore on the ground floor, we were assured of supportive neighbours. The interior staircase up to the clinic was useful for security purposes—if anyone broke in, it gave the nurses and doctors time to secure the patients—and there was a front stoop, perfect for rallies. The plan was to hold a symbolic opening for the media at 10 a.m. Dr. Morgentaler, who lived in Montreal, would arrive at 3 p.m., say a few words, and then go inside.

Continued: https://this.org/2018/06/13/what-it-was-like-to-fight-at-an-illegal-abortion-clinic-in-toronto-during-the-1980s/

13.06.2018