Clinicians to Lawmakers: Abortion Bans in the United States are Causing a Health and Human Rights Crisis

On the 51st anniversary of Roe v. Wade, abortion bans continue to harm patients and put clinicians in impossible situations. Physicians for Human Rights joins the renewed call for protection of fundamental rights to health and reproductive justice.

January 18, 2024
By William Jaffe, Advocacy Coordinator

January 22 will mark the 51st anniversary of Roe v. Wade, which established federal protection of the right to abortion in the United States. Since June 2022, when the Supreme Court reversed Roe, at least 14 states have adopted abortion bans imposing severe civil and criminal penalties on clinicians for providing abortion except in very narrow circumstances.

Health and human rights advocates across the United States – including Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) – oppose these bans and the profound harm they cause, to patients and clinicians alike. Read on for a recap of PHR’s work on reproductive justice at the national and international arenas, and a look at how we’re gearing up for the year ahead.

Continued: https://phr.org/our-work/resources/clinicians-to-lawmakers-abortion-bans-in-the-united-states-are-causing-a-health-and-human-rights-crisis/

UN experts say U.S. abortion bans violate human rights

New recommendations call on the U.S. to fully decriminalize abortion

November 17, 2023

The United States is violating human rights by denying legal access to abortion—and should take immediate action to end the criminalization of abortion at the federal, state and local levels. This is the newly released conclusion of the United Nations Human Rights Committee in response to testimony from Ipas and partners in October.

“This is a reckoning for U.S. policymakers at every level of government,” said Bethany Van Kampen Saravia, Ipas senior legal and policy advisor, who attended the October hearing in Geneva. “The UN Human Rights Committee has appropriately called on the U.S. government to acknowledge the human rights crisis that is taking place within America, as states continue to ban abortion and limit access to sexual and reproductive health care.”

Continued: https://www.ipas.org/news/un-experts-say-u-s-abortion-bans-violate-human-rights/

UNHRC asks PH to decriminalize abortion as data show ban ineffective, deadly

By: Cristina Eloisa Baclig
November 07, 2022

MANILA, Philippines—The United Nations Human Rights Committee (UNHRC) called on the Philippine government to decriminalize abortion and improve sexual and reproductive health services such as post-abortion healthcare in the country.

UNHRC, in a recently released concluding observation at its 136th session, said it acknowledged the Philippines’ “efforts to reduce unsafe abortion and maternal mortality.”

Continued: https://newsinfo.inquirer.net/1690191/unhrc-asks-ph-to-decriminalize-abortion-as-data-show-ban-ineffective-deadly

Uganda rejects UN definition of abortion as a human right

Monday, September 26, 2022
By JANE NAFULA

Uganda has joined several other African countries to oppose the contentious United Nations Human Rights Committee’s definition of abortion as a human right.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) defines abortion as termination of pregnancy prior to 20 weeks gestation.

Continued: https://www.monitor.co.ug/uganda/news/national/uganda-rejects-un-definition-of-abortion-as-a-human-right-3962018

Four reasons safe abortion is critical health care

July 20, 2022
International Rescue Committee

No one should be forced to carry a pregnancy to term against their will. The ruling from the United States Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade strips millions of people of the right to control their bodies and to make the decisions that shape their lives, families and futures.

The toll of this decision will fall heaviest
on already-marginalized people, including communities that the International
Rescue Committee (IRC) serves. Experts project that the U.S., which already has
high maternal mortality rates, will only see more people dying due to
restrictions on abortion care.

Continued: https://www.rescue.org/article/four-reasons-safe-abortion-critical-health-care

20.07.2022

Commentary

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International Rescue Committee

maternal mortality

restrictive abortion laws

Roe v. Wade

United Nations Human Rights Committee

Poor Decision-Making: Abortion and American Violations of Human Rights Law

By Chinyere Obasi
July 17, 2022

The most prolific human rights organizations in the United States and abroad value equal and unrestricted access to all maternal care, including abortion, as a human right.

At home, the American Civil Liberties Union has fought for the right to abortion since the 1950s, and Physicians for Human Rights has reaffirmed this stance as recently as May of 2022. Abroad, the Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and the World Health Organization have all argued the same: Access to abortion is a human right. The United Nations Human Rights Committee, the U.N.’s official body designed to advocate for and protect such liberties, wrote in a 2018 statement that “States parties must provide safe, legal and effective access to abortion” when the pregnant person is at risk of harm, physical or otherwise, and that those parties should not take steps toward criminalizing abortion, which would inherently promote unsafe abortion.

Continued: https://harvardpolitics.com/poor-decision-making/

Abortion is essential healthcare and women’s health must be prioritized over politics

International Safe Abortion Day
28 September 2021
United Nations Human Rights, Office of the High Commissioner

On the International Safe Abortion Day, a group of UN experts* stress that abortion is essential health care and a human right. Denial of access to abortion services jeopardizes a person's physical and mental health and takes away their autonomy and agency. It unjustly denies them the freedom to live with dignity and on equal terms with other human beings while exposing them to various forms of violence and oppression.

Furthermore, and as Human Rights bodies have long acknowledged, the denial of abortion services through the criminalization of abortion or through barriers and delays in access to lawful services can in certain circumstances constitute cruel, degrading, and inhumane treatment, may amount to torture and could lead to arbitrary detention.

Continued: https://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=27549&LangID=E

Abortion in Italy, a Right Wronged

Abortion in Italy, a Right Wronged

By ILARIA MARIA SALA
NOV. 13, 2017

Late last month, Cosimo Borraccino, a left-wing member of the regional council for Apulia, in southern Italy, proposed passing a local law to require the enforcement of national legislation granting women access to abortion. His opponents on the council, mostly from center-right parties, said the bill was unnecessary and that Mr. Borraccino was “slamming into a wall of self-evidence.”

Yet when it comes to reproductive rights in Italy, respect of the law is anything but self-evident. In fact, 9 out of 10 gynecologists in Apulia refuse to perform abortions, even though the right to obtain one has been legal since 1978. Nationwide statistics are only slightly less staggering: Seven out of 10 gynecologists in Italy won’t terminate a pregnancy.

Continued at source: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/13/opinion/abortion-italy-conscientious-objectors.html

Ireland: Varadkar announces abortion referendum for next year

Varadkar announces abortion referendum for next year
15 Jun 2017
Kenneth Fox

Simon Harris will be responsible for bringing forward the legislation

Amidst the news of a new Taoisech in the Dáil and the announcement of his Cabinet, the news that Leo Varadkar had confirmed an abortion referendum, seemed to slip through the cracks.

Yesterday he confirmed that the referendum will take place sometime next year.

He said Health Minister Simon Harris would be responsible for bringing forward legislation to allow for the referendum on the eight amendment, which gives an equal right to life to the mother and the unborn.

Continued at link: NewsTalk: http://www.newstalk.com/Varadkar-announces-abortion-referendum-for-next-year-

15.06.2017

United Nations Human Rights Committee

Irish abortion law violated woman’s human rights, UN says

Siobhan Whelan forced to travel to UK for abortion after fatal foetal abnormality diagnosis

June 13, 2017
Paul Cullen

A United Nations committee has found Ireland violated the human rights of a woman who had to travel to Britain for an abortion after her baby was diagnosed with a fatal foetal abnormality.
The UN human rights committee has told the State to pay compensation to the woman, Siobhan Whelan, and to provide psychological treatment to her.

Continued at source: Irish Times: https://www.irishtimes.com/news/health/irish-abortion-law-violated-woman-s-human-rights-un-says-1.3118145