February 4, 2021
Sara E Casey, Emily A Maistrellis, Terry McGovern
US President Joe Biden has reversed a Trump administration policy that prohibited US funding for nongovernmental groups that provide or refer patients for abortions.
The Global Gag Rule, also known as the Mexico City Policy, was enacted in 1984 by President Ronald Reagan. Since its introduction, the policy has been instated by each Republican president and rescinded by each Democrat president.
Madagascar's 'angel makers' flourish in ban on abortion
01 Sep 2019
ANTANANARIVO: Volatiana keeps her secret behind a flimsy wooden gate, tucked along a red brick wall at the back of her vegetable garden in Madagascar's Antananarivo.
"There are around eight foetuses buried here," said the Malagasy mother of six, standing on a narrow patch of land hidden behind a corrugated metal sheet.
MADAGASCAR: 28 SEPTEMBER REPORT – Nous pouvons éviter que des femmes meurent (We can prevent women dying)
by International Campaign for Women's Right to Safe Abortion
Oct 30, 2018
by Lovatiana Andriamboavonjy, Nifin’akanga, Madagascar
In Madagascar, the Minister of Public Health announced that an estimated 75,000 abortions take place per year in the country, that there is one abortion per ten live births and based on data from East Africa, there are about 575 deaths from complications of unsafe abortion on the Madagascar mainland per year. Complications of unsafe abortion are the second highest cause of maternal deaths registered in the health system, after antenatal and post-partum haemorrhage. In a study at the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Gynécologie-Obstétrique Befelatanana in 2012-13, there were 360 cases of complications of unsafe abortion, with a fatality rate of 4.16%. According to another study in this same hospital in 2011-12, the majority of those treated for complications were aged 15-24 years, with the age range being 15-43 years of age. 70% of cases were due to haemorrhage, and 30% due to sepsis. But these data do not reflect the reality outside of hospital clinics, where many women never seek treatment and die of post-abortion complications. These problems are all due to abortions being prohibited in the law, and take place clandestinely, using unsafe, often traditional methods.
How a change in U.S. abortion policy reverberated around the globe
Health-care workers in Madagascar and dozens of other countries have faced new obstacles since Trump signed an order tying U.S. aid to antiabortion rules.
By Max Bearak and Carol Morello
Photo and video by Carolyn Van Houten
Oct. 10, 2018
BETSINGILO, Madagascar — Nana thought for a second, and then shook her head. Donald Trump? No, never heard of him.
Her humble, earthen home and field of cassava are about as far from Washington as it gets. She lives in Madagascar, an impoverished island hundreds of miles off the coast of Africa — and tiny Betsingilo is a week-long trip by bus from the country’s capital.
The distance has not stopped Trump’s foreign policy from affecting people’s lives here.
MADAGASCAR – Decriminalise abortion: four panellists in a public meeting give their points of view
July 20, 2018
by International Campaign for Women's Right to Safe Abortion
In Madagascar, abortion is a crime, punishable by the Penal Code, which has been in place since the colonial period, stemming from the Napoleonic Code of 1810. In December 2017, there was an attempt in Parliament, to decriminalise therapeutic abortion. In vain. But as the presidential election approaches, the association which fights for the legalisation of abortion called Nifin’Akanga, named after an abortifacient plant widely used in Madagascar to induce abortion, has revived the debate. The group hopes to encourage the candidates to take a stand on this social issue.
Abortion in Madagascar is a taboo subject, they say. But it’s more than that, it’s a lot of hypocrisy around a major topic of public health, says one of the participants in the debate. A sensitive issue, and difficult to quantify.
Trump-Pence Administration’s Neocolonial Assault on Reproductive Freedom Is Killing African Women and Girls
Jan 23, 2018
Hayley Farless
As advocates and researchers have seen, it is African women and girls who are suffering because of the United States’ interference with reproductive autonomy globally.
Just three days after his inauguration, President Donald Trump issued a memorandum to reinstate and expand the “global gag rule,” a Reagan-era, anti-abortion, foreign policy directive, with the backing of Vice President Mike Pence. Because of this policy, any nongovernmental organization (NGO) outside of the United States that provides abortion procedures, participates in pro-choice advocacy, supplies information about abortion, or offers referrals to abortion providers has been forced to choose between forfeiting U.S. foreign assistance funding or ceasing to provide the basic reproductive health services that its patients need.
The global gag rule, also known as the “Mexico City Policy,” goes beyond just blocking U.S. funding for critical reproductive health services. A Center for Health and Gender Equity (CHANGE) research report notes that this policy also restricts what groups receiving U.S. funds can do with money from all other sources; organizations must subject all their funds to the same restrictions or lose U.S. funding.
MADAGASCAR – Seven boys and seven girls?: A response to Senator Olivier Rakotovazaha
Jan 16, 2018
by International Campaign for Women's Right to Safe Abortion
During the debate in the Malagasy Parliament on 13 December 2017, referring to the abortion clauses in the new family planning law, Senator Olivier Rakotovazaha said: “Abortion is not consistent with Malagasy culture. Our blessings encourage even young married women to give birth to seven girls and seven boys.” This is a response to the Senator from Richard J Randriamandrato, special advisor to the President of the Malagasy Senate since February 2016, published in L’Express on 3 January 2018:
The adoption by the Parliament of the Law on Reproductive Health and Family Planning is good news. An important step in the field of public health has been taken. This law will allow State and non-State actors involved in the field to strengthen the education of families, and particularly of young girls and boys, to avoid unwanted pregnancies. We therefore welcome this advance, which can be credited to the Minister of Public Health, Professor Lalatiana Andriamanarivo, a world renowned paediatric surgeon who had the courage to defend the bill as early as June 2017.
Continued at source: http://www.safeabortionwomensright.org/madagascar-seven-boys-and-seven-girls-a-response-to-senator-olivier%e2%80%88rakotovazaha/
How a White House reversal affects a village in Madagascar
On an island where 10 women a day die from complications from pregnancy and childbirth, the funding cutoff by USAID because of its new abortion rules can have serious consequences.
By Annie Burns-Pieper
Special to the Star
Sat., Nov. 25, 2017
AMPAHO, MADAGASCAR—Ampaho feels like the edge of the world, somewhere most people, even in Madagascar, will never go.
The community of 240 small bamboo huts sits along a slow-moving waterway not far from the shore of the Indian Ocean on Madagascar’s east coast. The trip from the capital, Antananarivo, to Ampaho takes two days by car along the country’s winding roads followed by a meandering voyage on a rustic boat through the Panagalane canal.
On a rainy night five years ago, Marigrety Razafindramiarana’s daughter Marthe ran into trouble giving birth to her eighth child. The family had few options.
Continued at source: https://www.thestar.com/news/insight/2017/11/25/how-a-white-house-reversal-affects-a-village-in-madagascar.html
Madagascar – Tribute to Simone Veil launches national discussion on decriminalisation of abortion
by International Campaign for Women's Right to Safe Abortion
Nov 22, 2017
This is a translation into English of a blog by Mialy Randriamampianina, entitled “Vie de femmes – L’avortement, ce drame sous licence” published in L’express de Madagascar on 6 October 2017.
There are 75,000 clandestine abortions in Madagascar each year, according to data from the Ministry of Public Health, analysed by the University of Ankatso. Behind these figures, women’s lives are at stake. Abortion is still illegal and criminalised, first imposed under French colonial law.
Now, the National Council for Women of Madagascar have launched a discussion about the law on abortion. The discussion was opened on 27 September this year, during a meeting to pay tribute to Simone Veil, the French Minister who changed the abortion law in France.
Madagascar set to update colonial family planning and abortion law…
by International Campaign for Women's Right to Safe Abortion
Oct 24, 2017
Madagascar’s Senate was set to debate legislation modernising a family planning law from 1920 that prohibits the promotion of contraception and criminalised abortion, a leftover from the French colonial era. Advocates say the most important part of the new law is the commitment to making access to reproductive health services a universal right, regardless of age.
At present there is confusion over the legality of providing contraception to young people; certain interpretations suggest that under-18s require parental permission to use contraception. Lalaina Razafinirinasoa, country director of Marie Stopes International in Madagascar, says one doctor she worked with faced legal action and a fine for providing contraception to an under-age girl after her parents complained. While such cases are rare, a lack of clear guidelines on contraception for young people has created concern among frontline health workers. According to Pierre-Loup Lesage, head of Population Services International in Madagascar, 50% of first pregnancies happen before 18 years old in the country.
If passed as currently written, the new law would also allow abortion when the woman’s life is in danger, with the written approval of two doctors. How many girls and women would that make a difference to, one might ask.
SOURCE: Reuters, by Annie Burns-Pieper, 16 October 2017 ; PHOTO
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