Argentina’s Abortion Law Three Years Later

The country's abortion law has reduced fertility rates and preventable deaths among girls ages 10 to 14

By Maria Emilia Pianesi
December 4, 2024

Each year, comprehensive abortion care could save the lives of up to nearly 39,000 women and prevent related health complications for 5 million women worldwide. A multicountry survey on the implementation of comprehensive abortion policies in Latin America and the Caribbean found that safe abortions and quality post-abortion care in the region is limited by some of the most restrictive abortion laws in the world. As a result, the issue remains a major health and policy challenge in the region.

In this context, Argentina has taken a historic step for sexual and reproductive health and rights by legalizing abortion. Law 27.610, Access to Voluntary Interruption of Pregnancy and Post-Abortion Care, has been enforced since January 2021. It allows anyone to request an abortion before 14 weeks of pregnancy and entails no time limit in cases of sexual assault or when the life of the applicant is in danger.

Continued: https://www.thinkglobalhealth.org/article/argentinas-abortion-law-three-years-later

Nepal – Access denied: Unsafe abortion continues despite legalisation 22 years ago

Ten percent of women are denied abortion services, and 42 percent with pregnancies beyond 10 weeks are turned away, new report says.

Arjun Poudel
November 29, 2024

Although abortion was legalised in Nepal in 2002, unsafe abortions are still rampant in many places throughout the country, and women are denied services, a new report shows.

According to the report prepared by Center for Research on Environment Health and Population Activities (CREHPA), and the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), one in 10 women seeking abortions at health facilities was denied care.

Moreover, four in 10 women (42 percent) with more than 10 weeks of pregnancy or who were unaware of their gestational age were denied an abortion.

Continued: https://kathmandupost.com/health/2024/11/29/access-denied-unsafe-abortion-continues-despite-legalisation-22-years-ago

29.11.2024

News

barriers to access

Center for Research on Environment Health and Population Activities

A disturbing judicial trend to inhibit access to abortion services in India

Two decisions, one of the Kerala High Court and the other of the Supreme Court of India represent a disturbing new trend of courts leaning away from respect for bodily autonomy and the choice of a pregnant person in access to abortion services.

MUSKAN TIBREWALA
JANUARY 7, 2024

IN a short span of four days, from December 18 to December 22, the fate of a 12-year-old girl child who is pregnant due to rape by her minor brother was decided by the Kerala High Court.

The girl child sought termination of the pregnancy on the ground that giving birth would lead to “cataclysmic consequences to her physiological and psychological condition”.

Continued: https://theleaflet.in/a-disturbing-judicial-trend-to-inhibit-access-to-abortion-services-in-india/

07.01.2024

Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act

Kerala High Court

Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act of 1971

Applying global lessons to protect abortion access in the United States

Strategies used in other countries, such as state referendums and strategic litigation, can help restore and protect abortion access in the United States, argue Terry McGovern and colleagues.

BMJ 2024; 384
https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj-2022-073833
Published 03 January 2024

Terry McGovern, Mary Favier, Laura Gil, Bonsitu Kitaba-Gaviglio, Clarisa Bencomo, Ira Memaj, Samantha Garbers, Malia Maier

Since the US Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade in 2022, eliminating the federal constitutional right to an abortion, the introduction of state laws and policies has made the legal and healthcare landscape more challenging. Twenty states have banned or severely restricted abortion care,1 and recent legislation is restricting access to abortion medication as well as abortion services, with Wyoming becoming the first state explicitly to ban the use of abortion medication.2

In response, US abortion rights advocates have pushed to extend federal protections and the federal government has taken important steps to expand and protect access to medication abortion. These efforts have focused on strengthening executive branch rules and guidance because the lack of a pro-abortion majority in Congress prevents legislation being passed to protect abortion. In January 2023, the US Food and Drug Administration eliminated a requirement that mifepristone, the most common form of medication abortion, be dispensed in person.3 In December 2022, the Department of Justice ruled that it was legal to post mifepristone or misoprostol, another drug often used in medication abortion, to anyone seeking an abortion.4 While these efforts are critical, federal level mitigation strategies alone are insufficient to preserve and expand abortion access and are vulnerable to legal challenges, especially if an anti-abortion administration is elected in 2024.

Continued: https://www.bmj.com/content/384/bmj-2022-073833

USA – The Impact Of Restrictive Abortion Laws In 2023

JANUARY 1, 2024
15-Minute Listen

From NPR's daily news podcast, Consider This: Nearly two years into Roe v. Wade being overturned, pregnant people continue to have a hard time accessing abortion and miscarriage care. This year saw the addition of new restrictive abortion laws in some states and protection of existing abortion laws in others.

What does this mean for abortion care in 2024, and how might all of this affect the 2024 elections?

Continued: https://www.npr.org/2024/01/01/1197958788/restrictive-abortion-laws-2023

01.01.2024

Interviews/Podcasts

anti-choice restrictions

barriers to access

restrictive abortion laws

Italy’s resurgent right takes on a woman’s right to choose

BY JOANNA GILL, THOMSON REUTERS FOUNDATION
Jan 9, 2023

NAPLES/ROME – If it was hard enough for Beatrice to get an abortion when she had the law on her side, imagine how other women will cope should Italy’s rising right get its way on reproductive rights.

“What I have been through is very painful, but it is even worse knowing that there are other women out there who are going to go through the same thing,” she said. The 24-year-old law student was in a new relationship when she took a pregnancy test in the summer of 2021 after her suspicions were raised by unusual bouts of nausea.

Continued: https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2023/01/09/world/social-issues-world/italy-resurgent-right-abortion-rights/

Australia – ‘Really desperate’: Concerns emerge about access to regional abortion care

By Ellie Mitchell
December 22 2022

A pervasive stigma, hard-to-find information, scarcity of providers, and denial of care on religious grounds. These are all part of the maze regional people who are seeking abortions must navigate in modern Australia.

"One woman left her town because of her experience of being turned away from the local GP," University of Sydney rural pregnancy researcher Anna Noonan told ACM.

Continued: https://www.mandurahmail.com.au/story/8024978/really-desperate-concerns-emerge-about-access-to-regional-abortion-care/

22.12.2022

The State of Abortion Access in Canada

Before patting ourselves on the back for having the right to choose, we should examine pregnancy-termination issues within our borders.

BY : CAITLIN STALL-PAQUET
DEC 8TH, 2022

Last June, after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling, which gave Americans the fundamental right to choose to have an abortion, anxiety, fear and anger increased proportionally throughout the country. The sentiment was understandably echoed on this side of the border too. A loud cry rang out, commensurate to the gut punch delivered by this gigantic step backwards for reproductive rights, which was spurred by an anti-abortion movement that deigns to call itself “pro-life.” However, the “at-least-we’re-not-the-States” attitude often blinds Canadians to our own widespread problems regarding abortion. “You can hold two [opinions] at once—you can both have empathy, support and outrage for [our] colleagues in the U.S. and also say ‘We actually have [access] issues,’” says Dr. Geneviève Bois, a family doctor who splits her time working between Montreal and Whapmagoostui in northern Quebec.

Continued: https://www.ellecanada.com/culture/society/the-state-of-abortion-access-in-canada

On reproductive rights, India’s MTP and Surrogacy Acts don’t go far enough

A person’s right to choose to end the pregnancy in the first few weeks is still not recognised in India. After overturning of Roe v Wade, measuring ourselves on a yardstick of regression shouldn’t become our way of governance

Angellica Aribam
July 1, 2022

Is India really ahead of the West in terms of reproductive rights? Contrary to
the grandstanding since the overturning of the landmark Roe V. Wade judgment,
the truth is, no. Bodily autonomy and reproductive rights must be viewed from
three lenses — legal, medical, and social. Only when women and non-binary
pregnant people enjoy absolute autonomy over their own bodies by these
parameters, can one claim that India is showing the way to the West.

First, the legal standpoint: The Medical Termination of Pregnancy (Amendment)
Act 2021 is far from ideal and has been criticised for not taking a
rights-based approach. It doesn’t give the pregnant person complete autonomy in
ending the pregnancy, instead making them go through various systemic barriers.

Continued: https://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/abortion-laws-united-states-her-body-her-choice-8001845/

01.07.2022

Femme First Foundation

Medical Termination of Pregnancy (Amendment) Act 2021

Medical Termination Of Pregnancy (MTP) Act

Surrogacy (Regulation) Act 2021

What Happens When It’s Too Late to Get an Abortion

Nov. 22, 2021
By Diana Greene Foster
New York Times

On Dec. 1, the Supreme Court will consider the constitutionality of Mississippi’s ban on abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy. If the court decides to uphold the Mississippi law — as it may well do — that would mean American abortion rights would no longer be protected up to the point of fetal viability, or about 24 weeks of pregnancy.

Replacing this viability standard, which has been in place since 1992, with some lower threshold is sometimes framed as a necessary compromise between people who oppose abortion rights and those who support them. The suggestion is that Americans should relinquish the right to abortion in the second trimester to preserve access in the first, which is when about 90 percent of abortions take place.

Continued: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/22/opinion/abortion-supreme-court-women-law.html