The safety concern in abortion debate

Mohammad Javed Pasha
July 31, 2022

Abortion is a public health concern besides being a sensitive issue with religious, moral, cultural and political dimensions. More than a quarter of the world’s people live in countries where the procedure is permitted only in cases of rape, incest, fetal abnormalities or to save the pregnant person’s life. Abortions still occur in these countries, nearly half of them are unsafe, performed by unskilled practitioners or in unhygienic conditions, or both.

Abortions performed in unsafe conditions claim the lives of tens of thousands of women around the world every year and leave many times that with chronic and often irreversible physical and mental health problems becoming a drain on the resources of public health systems. Controversy, however, often overshadows the public health impact. An estimated 73 million abortions occur globally each year. Unsafe abortions accounts for up to 13 percent of deaths related to pregnancy and childbirth worldwide. Globally, at least 7 million women are treated every year for complications from unsafe abortions.

Continued: https://www.thenews.com.pk/tns/detail/978303-the-safety-concern-in-abortion-debate

31.07.2022

Commentary

Featured

International Conference on Population and development

maternal deaths

Medical Termination Of Pregnancy (MTP) Act

Mohammad Javed Pasha

World Health Organisation

‘Baby Killer’: Abortion Vote Is Pitting Neighbor Against Neighbor in Kansas

‘Pulled-up yard signs, nasty notes, and catcalls as Kansas becomes the first state to vote on abortion since the fall of Roe v. Wade.
By Carter Sherman
July 31, 2022

WICHITA, Kansas — On the eve of the first
state vote on abortion rights in the country since the fall of Roe v. Wade, the
lawn signs in this quiet neighborhood of nearly identical, brick-and-beige
homes hint at the strong feelings of people living inside.

“Vote No” signs suggest they will vote to preserve the Kansas state
constitution, which currently protects abortion rights. A “Value Them Both”
sign signals they’ll vote to amend the constitution, handing Republicans in the
state the power to ban abortion.

Continued: https://www.vice.com/en/article/n7zzeg/abortion-vote-kansas

Australia – Victorian public hospitals could not prevent doctors from providing abortions under new bill

Reason party leader Fiona Patten, who is introducing the bill, says ‘imposed religious faith has no place in the public health system’

Tamsin Rose
Sun 31 Jul 2022

Public hospitals in Victoria would not be allowed to stop doctors from providing abortions under a bill being introduced to state parliament this week by the crossbench MP Fiona Patten.

The legislation follows the overturning of
the landmark Roe v Wade decision in the US in June, and comes with just four
more sitting weeks before Victorians head to the polls in November.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/aug/01/victorian-public-hospitals-could-not-prevent-doctors-from-providing-abortions-under-new-bill

31.07.2022

conscientious objection

Leave My Disability Out of Your Anti-Abortion Propaganda

July 31, 2022
By Kendall Ciesemier

Thirty years ago, when my mother was pregnant, an ultrasound revealed troubling abnormalities: the fetus’s organs were misarranged. This condition, she was told by her doctor, correlated with a wide variety of disabilities that could cause the baby to die at birth. The doctor told my mother that she could seek an abortion. She wanted her to know her options.

My parents had good health insurance, a steady income and a strong support system. They chose to proceed with the pregnancy. A few months later, I was born to a crowd of doctors waiting to assess and treat my condition. I had my first of many major surgeries at 8 weeks old. My parents went to sleep every night praying I’d see another birthday.

Continued: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/31/opinion/disability-rights-anti-abortion.html

31.07.2022

disability and abortion

disabled fetuses

disabled women and abortion

USA – How to Make an Abortion Emergency Plan Right Now

So you can get the care you deserve as quickly as possible.
By Korin Miller
July 30, 2022

By now, you’re probably well aware that Roe v. Wade, the landmark Supreme Court ruling that guaranteed the right to abortion in the U.S. on a federal level, has been overturned. With that, many people across the country now live in states where abortion is illegal or severely restricted—and access to crucial reproductive health care is only expected to become more challenging.

People are scared, and it’s understandable. There are a lot of changes happening right now and the rights that you had a month ago may no longer exist in your state. That’s why experts say it’s essential to anticipate what could happen if you need an abortion—and what actions you would need to consider taking to get the care you deserve.

https://www.self.com/story/abortion-emergency-plan

Anti-Abortion Extremism Fueling American Dystopia

Contraceptives banned. Miscarriages prosecuted. Pregnant people under surveillance. Is this the future Americans want?

MITCHELL ZIMMERMAN
July 30, 2022

It's January 2026. The Republican president thanks Congress for banning all abortions and makes an enthusiastic plea for a law that would require a national registry of pregnant women, so their pregnancies could be subject to surveillance.

Far-fetched? Not the way things are going. When it comes to extremism, Republican politicians are racing each other to the bottom.

Continued: https://www.commondreams.org/views/2022/07/30/anti-abortion-extremism-fueling-american-dystopia

30.07.2022

Commentary

Featured

abortion bounty hunters

anti-choice vigilantes

bounty hunting of abortion providers

UK – Pregnant woman shocked after GP ‘gave her anti-abortion leaflet’

Woman was reportedly handed information from the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children at London clinic

Shanti Das
Sat 30 Jul 2022

A pregnant woman who told her GP she was considering having an abortion says she was left “shocked and traumatised” after being given a leaflet for an anti-abortion group.

The woman, 38, says she was seeking treatment for a bladder problem on 19 July when a doctor at All Saints Medical Centre in Plumstead, south-east London, asked whether she was pregnant.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jul/30/pregnant-woman-shocked-gp-anti-abortion-leaflet-society-protection-unborn-children-spuc

Abortion opponents pushing for more restrictions, laws across U.S.

By Amy Forliti and Geoff Mulvihill, The Associated Press
Posted July 30, 2022

Now that Roe v. Wade has been toppled, abortion opponents are taking a multifaceted approach in their quest to end abortions nationwide, targeting their strategies to the dynamics of each state as they attempt to create new laws and defend bans in courts.

One anti-abortion group has proposed model legislation that would ban all abortions except to prevent the death of a pregnant woman. New legal frontiers could include prosecuting doctors who defy bans, and skirmishes over access to medication abortions already are underway. Others hope to get more conservatives elected in November to advance an anti-abortion agenda.

|Continued: https://globalnews.ca/news/9027063/u-s-abortion-opponents-more-restrictions/

30.07.2022

Alliance Defending Freedom

model anti-choice bills

National Right to Life

Roe v. Wade

Biden nominates abortion rights lawyer in U.S. Supreme Court case to federal judgeship

July 29, 2022
By Nate Raymond, Reuters

President Joe Biden on Friday nominated a lawyer who represented the Mississippi clinic at the heart of the U.S. Supreme Court's decision to overturn its landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade abortion rights decision to become a federal appeals court judge.

Biden's latest slate of nine new judicial nominees included Julie Rikelman, an abortion rights lawyer with the Center for Reproductive Rights whom the president picked to serve on the Boston-based 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Continued: https://www.reuters.com/world/us/biden-nominates-abortion-rights-lawyer-us-supreme-court-case-federal-judgeship-2022-07-29/

29.07.2022

Featured

News

Center for Reproductive Rights

Jackson Women’s Health Organization

When Can Dying Patients Get a Lifesaving Abortion? These Hospital Panels Will Now Decide.

Abortion bans force ethics committees to determine when a pregnancy is lethal enough to justify termination.

BY MARK JOSEPH STERN
JULY 29, 2022

When Elizabeth Weller’s water broke during the 18th week of her pregnancy, the prognosis was bleak: With almost no amniotic fluid left, the fetus could not survive. If Weller did not terminate immediately, she would be at risk of a potentially lethal uterine infection. She requested an abortion, but the hospital’s ethics committee refused. The committee feared that if doctors terminated Weller’s pregnancy before she was actively dying, they would face liability under Texas’ six-week abortion ban. So the committee forced her to wait until she had a high fever and “foul” discharge—symptoms of a serious infection in her uterus—to terminate.

Weller’s story, documented by Carrie Feibel in a wrenching NPR report, reflects a growing crisis in a post–Roe v. Wade America. Many states have banned or severely restricted abortion since the Supreme Court overturned Roe on June 24, enacting laws with extremely vague and narrow exceptions for the life of the mother. Health care providers have legitimate concerns that they will face civil and criminal liability if they terminate a pregnancy under any circumstances. They worry that judges, juries, and prosecutors will disagree that the patient had a true medical emergency. And so the decision shifts from the patient to the hospital, which frequently places these delicate considerations in the hands of ethics committees.

Continued: https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/07/abortion-ban-hospital-ethics-committee-mother-life-death.html