High Court ruling against free access to abortion for Northern Irish women

Today, a High Court judgement ruled that women from Northern Ireland are not entitled to access abortion free of charge through the NHS in England. 

Abortion is severely restricted in Northern Ireland and is only available where the pregnant woman’s life is in danger or where there is a risk of permanent and serious damage to her physical or mental health. This means that the vast majority of those seeking abortion in Northern Ireland will need to travel to access a safe, legal procedure. Currently, these women are required to pay for the procedure, which can range from approximately £400 to over £1000 for those at a later stage of pregnancy. The test case brought to the High Court by two women was rejected, meaning that the need for Northern Irish women to pay for abortion procedures carried out in England remains.

Northern Ireland is not covered by the current 1967 Abortion Act which applies in England, Scotland and Wales. The key legislation governing abortion in Northern Ireland comes from the Offences against the Person Act 1861. This means that women’s access to reproductive health care is managed according to a law which is over 150 years old and precedes the invention of the telephone and the light bulb.

The restrictive law in Northern Ireland does not prevent Northern Irish women having abortions, but it does make it more difficult. Those who can afford the private clinic fee and travel costs to England will be able to access a safe, legal abortion, but might have to significantly rearrange work and childcare to do so. Others may face delays in their attempts to raise a large sum of money in a short period of time. Overall, abortion is safe, but is safest the earlier in pregnancy it is performed, so delayed access means higher prices and also an increased chance of complications.

Those without access to such funds will be forced to continue an unwanted pregnancy (which again, is likely to have severe financial implications for someone who cannot afford an abortion), or they will resort to an illegal and potentially unsafe method of ending the pregnancy. Abortion Support Network is an organisation which helps women in Ireland and Northern Ireland to afford the cost of an abortion abroad. Mara Clarke, who runs the organisation, details some of the desperate measures people have taken to try to end their pregnancies:

“We have mothers calling us, telling us that their 18-year-old daughter drank a bottle of floor cleaner after she was raped at her own birthday party. We hear about women taking whole packets of birth control and washing it down with vodka.”

Others unable to travel will buy abortion medication online through sites such as Women on Web – however, if they do, they risk life imprisonment for ‘procuring (their) own miscarriage’.

The latest statistics from England and Wales show that in 2012 905 women travelled from Northern Ireland to access abortion. Many more will have travelled elsewhere or bought illegal abortion medication to end their pregnancies. Clearly, strict abortion laws do not stop abortions from happening, but can make them less safe by causing delay and restricting access. Abortion for Northern Irish women is largely a matter of economic resource. As Mara Clarke puts it, “women with money have options, women without money have babies”.

As a young people’s project we're particularly concerned about young women’s access to reproductive healthcare. In 2012, 43% of abortions in England and Wales for Northern Irish residents were for those under 25. Young women are less likely to have the resources necessary to travel and pay for a private abortion. A pregnant teenager seeking an abortion in Northern Ireland may suffer from stigma and lack of support, as well as financial limitations. 

The young woman who presented a test case to the High Court was just 15 when she became pregnant and travelled to Manchester for an abortion. Her mother paid £600 for the procedure, some of which was covered by the Abortion Support Network, and described the process of raising the funds as ‘harrowing’. Not all young women will have the support of their families. We believe that the abortion law in Northern Ireland should be brought into line with the rest of the UK, so that all women, especially young women, are able to access the full range of reproductive healthcare they need, which includes abortion.

'Women with money have options, women without money have babies'

This is a guest blog from Mara Clarke, founder and director of the Abortion Support Network.

What would you do if the condom broke? If your pill hadn't worked? If you had been raped? If you were faced with an unplanned, unwanted pregnancy? What would you do?

If you lived in England, Scotland or Wales, you could go to your GP or your local sexual health clinic, and get a referral for an abortion. You could do this regardless of your race, class, financial situation, or age. You could make this decision on your own, or with the support of your parents, or friends.

But what if you lived in a country where abortion was illegal? And you couldn't tell your parents? And your boyfriend threatened to paint “murderer” on your house, if you had a boyfriend? And you had no money? And no credit card, passport or photo ID?

Abortion is virtually against the law in Ireland and Northern Ireland. This is the case whether you are pregnant as a result of rape, whether the foetus has catastrophic abnormalities, if the woman involved is 14, or if, like most women having abortions, it simply isn't the right time to have a baby. But of course as we all know, making abortion against the law doesn't stop abortion from happening. It just means that, when faced with an unplanned, unwanted pregnancy, women with money have options and women without money have babies – or do dangerous and desperate things.

This is even more true for young women living in Ireland and Northern Ireland who need abortions. Because of the stigma, many of these young women aren't able to tell friends or family members. And yet somehow they need to raise the £400 to £2000 it can cost to travel and pay privately for an abortion.

Abortion Support Network is a charity that provides financial assistance, accommodation and confidential, practical information to women from Ireland and Northern Ireland forced to travel to access a safe, legal abortion. Since launching in October of 2009, we have heard from almost 1,000 women. More than 250 of those calls have been from women and girls under the age of 25. At least 30 of those were aged 16 or under.

Here’s an example of what these young women have told us:

“I can’t have this baby, I've been trying to get money together and I told the father and he left me. I'm in college and have no money. I depended on my parents and they will disown me if they knew I was pregnant. I'm getting really worried and I don’t know what to do. Anything will help. I know my time is nearly up so I'm beginning to really worry, I know I shouldn't have left it this long but this is my last option and I can’t have this baby.”

“If my parents find out I've had sex, they’ll kill me. I'm not kidding.”

A young teenager whose mother called us in desperation. The pregnancy was a result of rape and her daughter was severely self-harming.

“I'm 19 and a student and I'm approximately 18 weeks pregnant. I can’t financially and emotionally support a child so I'm planning on having an abortion. The problem is my partner and I have both been saving and scraping money together but we’re still short. I was enquiring as to whether we could get any assistance, be it monetary or just providing us with somewhere to stay when we get there.”

A young teenager with medical complications that could have been compromised by continuing her pregnancy. She and her boyfriend both sold their electronics in order to raise £100.

“I'm a college student and I'm pregnant. I can’t tell a soul and I'm devastated. My parents work so hard to put me through college that I can’t drop out to have a child. Never mind afford to support a child, nor necessarily want one at this stage in my life. Is there any assistance I could have or even an ear?”

A young teenager with an abusive ex-boyfriend. He was threatening her, to try and make her continue with the pregnancy. Her family were not in a position to provide support, emotionally or financially, a family friend put herself in debt to help with the costs but was still unable to provide the full cost.

“I'm growing more desperate by the week. I'm 6 weeks pregnant with an unwanted baby that I cannot have for financial and personal reasons. My boyfriend is unwilling to help with the costs of the abortion, as are my parents and his family. I have to cover this entire cost by myself and I am an unemployed student who will probably be homeless before long. Please let me know if there is anything you can do to help.”

These young women came from all parts of Ireland and Northern Ireland. Some had support and others didn't. Many had to delay their abortions as they tried to raise the necessary funds, causing even more expense as the price of abortion rises with gestation.

But what did these women have in common?

They were pregnant.
They didn't want to be pregnant.
They were poor.
And not a single one of them thought they would ever be in a position where they would have to call a total stranger in another country to ask for money for an abortion.

Mara Clarke is the founder of Abortion Support Network, an almost entirely volunteer run charity that helps women travelling from Ireland and Northern Ireland to access a safe and legal abortion. To find out how you can help or to sign up for their monthly eNewsletter visit www.abortionsupport.org.uk or follow @AbortionSupport on Twitter.

"How to get rid of a pregnancy"

Having seen people tweeting about the weird and wonderful ways readers reach their blogs, we decided to delve into our own statistics to see what people have been typing into Google to end up at this blog. 

Although of course plenty reached the EFC blog through links on other sites, or searches like 'abortion education in schools', one of the most common searches was the phrase 'how to get rid of a pregnancy'. Other popular searches included variations on 'pills to get rid of pregnancy'. Further investigation showed that quite a few people reached the EFC blog through a link on Ask.com which lead to this Mythbusting Monday post about medical abortion, explaining why the phrase 'abortion pill' can be misleading (Early Medical Abortion is actually a process involving two lots of medication, and two to three visits to a clinic, rather than just 'taking a pill').

It was sobering to realise that many people visiting this blog are not just looking for general information related to work or study but are likely themselves facing an unwanted pregnancy and unable to access the medical support they need to have an abortion. Sobering, but not all that surprising when you know that a decent proportion of visitors to this blog are from the USA and Ireland.

As you may know, although abortion is legal in the United States, access is severely restricted in some areas, meaning that those seeking abortion (especially poorer women) may look for 'cheaper' methods of ending a pregnancy, such as buying medication online. This graphic shows the varying levels of abortion access in the U.S - with mandatory waiting periods or insurance restrictions being enforced in many States, access to safe, legal abortion can be difficult.

Ireland, in turn, has one of the world's most restrictive abortion laws. Abortion is only available to save a pregnant person's life. Last year, almost 4000 women travelled from Ireland to England and Wales to have an abortion. Again, these women will have needed the financial means to pay for the procedure itself as well as transport and associated costs. Although the Abortion Support Network has been set up to help these women pay for the procedure, it can't support everyone. A recent article in Vice argued that more and more Irish women are turning to the internet to purchase abortion medication to administer themselves. The article points out that women taking this route are not recorded in the official statistics, although with hundreds of packages of such medication being seized every year, the number is clearly significant. 

Of course, ordering and using this medication is illegal in Ireland. But it seems that some are desperate enough to try to end a pregnancy even via methods which could put them in prison. And this is not just true of women in Ireland, or the U.S, but anywhere where abortion is illegal or restricted. And as the Guttmacher Institute makes clear, this method can be safer than traditional 'backstreet abortions' performed in unsanitary conditions: "In settings where abortion is illegal or highly restricted, it (abortion medication) has provided many women for the first time with a safe and discreet means for early termination of unwanted pregnancy." Safe Abortion Hotlines in places such as Chile, Poland and Kenya show that  where abortion is illegal or very severely restricted, there will still be women who find ways to end their pregnancies.

Unfortunately we were not surprised to see that some of these women had found their way to our site through searches for information on unwanted pregnancies which they cannot end in registered medical establishments, either due to legal, practical or economic constraints.

2012 Abortion Statistics

The latest statistics on abortions carried out in England and Wales were released today. The main findings are summarised below but you can view full information (including data tables) here. This year, the Department of Health also carried out a consultation on changes to the publication of abortion statistics, the results of which can be found here.

•    The 2012 abortion rate for all ages is 16.5 per 1,000 women – the lowest rate since 1997 and 6% lower than in 2011. The abortion rate was highest for women aged 21 (31 per 1000 women).

•    The under 16 and under 18 abortion rates were slightly lower than in 2011 (3 per 1000 and 12.8 per 1000 respectively).

•    The number of abortions taking place under 13 weeks gestation remains at 91%, and 97% of abortions were funded by the NHS. The percentage of medical abortions also remains consistent, at 48% (47% in 2011).

•    In 2012, 52% of women undergoing abortions had one or more previous pregnancies that resulted in a live or stillbirth.

A significant difference from 2011’s data is the number of non-resident women accessing abortion in England and Wales:

•    In 2012, there were 5,850 abortions for non-residents versus 6151 in 2011. The 2012 total is the lowest in any year since 1969.

The majority of non-residents accessing abortion in England and Wales are from the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland (making up 83.6% of the total number of non-residents in 2012). It’s unclear as to why this figure is lower than it has ever been but it’s possible that more women in Ireland are accessing medical abortion online; rising awareness of services like Women on Web through public campaigns may mean that more Irish women are using illegal methods to end their pregnancies rather than face the cost and difficulty of travelling abroad to do so.

Another interesting statistic which deserves to be unpicked is the over-representation of certain ethnic groups in the abortion statistics, particularly with regards to those women who have more than one abortion.

As you can see from the table, women who are of Black or Mixed ethnicity are more likely to have had one or more previous abortions than women of other ethnic backgrounds. The statistics do not tell us why this is, but we might question if the information provided to particular communities on contraception and abortion is relevant and accessible. We know that there are links between ethnicity and deprivation, and between deprivation and unintended pregnancy so this too might be a factor. More research is clearly needed  into the intersections between ethnicity, unintended pregnancy and abortion, but in the meantime, it is crucial to note that women from all backgrounds can and do experience unintended pregnancy and abortion and we should not shy away from providing culturally appropriate, evidence-based information in every setting.

As a result of the consultation on the publication of abortion statistics a few changes have been made, the most significant of which being local level statistics being presented by CCG (clinical commissioning groups) rather than PCT (primary care trust) data due to the changes to the health system.

One interesting aspect of the consultation was to see the number of anti-abortion groups which had responded, a number of whom requested information on fetal sex to be represented in the abortion data. This is presumably a response to recent scaremongering suggesting that 'sex selective abortions’ were taking place in the UK (despite the Department of Health’s own 2013 report finding that the UK’s ‘gender ratio’ is "well within the normal boundaries for populations").

The response to the consultation gives a firm response to this request:

"Information about the sex of the foetus and NHS number are not currently collected on  the HSA4 form. To collect such information would require changes to the  legislation, in  particular the Abortion Regulations 1991, as well as to clinical practice. This is not in the scope of this consultation. The majority of abortions take place before 10 weeks gestation and it is not currently possible to identify a foetus’s gender at that stage. Identifying the gender of aborted foetuses over 10 weeks’ gestation raises ethical and clinical issues. The Government has no plans to introduce such a practice."

What might the ‘Protection of Life During Pregnancy Bill’ mean for Irish women seeking abortion?

The Irish government has produced a bill which if passed, will, according to Prime Minister Enda Kenny, ‘clarify the circumstances’ in which medical practitioners can intervene to save a woman’s life by providing abortion. Kenny has stated that the new bill “would continue within the law to assert the restrictions on abortion that have applied in Ireland and which will apply in future”. In other words, it does not seek to change Irish law on abortion, which states that abortion is restricted only to cases where the pregnant woman’s life is in danger. Following the recent death of Savita Halappanavar in Galway there has been a demand for clarification on the circumstances in which doctors can legally provide life-saving treatment. Kenny claims that if the bill goes through it will “at last bring certainty to pregnant women and legal clarity to medical personnel who work within the system”.

So what does the bill actually say?

The bill is carefully worded so as not to present decision making around abortion as privileging the rights of the woman over the rights of the developing pregnancy. Suggested provisions are purely about saving a woman’s life in emergency situations and all efforts must be made to protect the ‘unborn child’ (as the pregnancy is referred to) wherever possible:

“Essentially the decision to be reached is not so much a balancing of the competing rights rather, it is a clinical assessment as to whether the mother's life, as opposed to her health, is threatened by a real and substantial risk that can only be averted by a termination of pregnancy.”

Some provision is made for those women who claim to be suicidal in the face of having to continue an unwanted pregnancy. It is proposed that in such cases, three doctors are to examine the woman and must reach a unanimous decision on the threat to her life. If the three doctors do not agree, the woman may appeal to another three consultants, meaning that her case could potentially be reviewed by six separate medical professionals.

What are people saying about the bill?

Members of the government claim that the bill would provide much needed clarity to enable doctors to work within the very restrictive Irish abortion law. However, there have been criticisms from both pro-choice and anti-abortion campaigners.

Some anti-abortion campaigners have evidenced concerns about the law being ‘relaxed’ with access to abortion expanded. Former Irish Prime Minister John Bruton said the idea that “a simple threat of suicide would make right something that would otherwise be wrong is a really dangerous principle”. And in a recent televised debate, a Fine Gael politician was asked if potentially fatal health risks are an 'acceptable risk' in pregnancy, or whether they are grounds for abortion in some cases. He responded: "But sure we’re all going to end up dead anyway." This begs the question of why he’s against abortion, and indeed whether he thinks medical care is redundant for all people whose lives may be in danger or just pregnant women.

Many pro-choice campaigners have taken issue with the ‘suicide clause’ in the bill. A spokesperson from the Centre for Reproductive Rights calls it ‘outrageous and paternalistic’ and goes on to criticise Irish abortion law more generally as being an “absolute violation of international human rights norms on women's right to health and dignity. It's totally off track with the rest of Europe."

In summation, the bill is not yet passed, and if it does go through both houses of Irish parliament, it will not make any changes to the law itself. Even with these amendments the thousands of Irish women who travel to the UK (and elsewhere) to access abortion would still need to do so. Arguably it might make provision for rare cases in which the woman's life is threatened but this will still sit within a legal framework which threatens to prosecute doctors whose actions are seen as being outside of these restrictions.

To follow the debate we suggest checking out the Irish ‘Doctors For Choice’ campaign which will provide regular updates.

The Protection of Life During Pregnancy Bill can be viewed in full here.

Have you heard about the condom train?

It was not until 1993 that condoms became fully available without prescription for everyone in Ireland. Access to contraception and reproductive control has long been a site of struggle for the women’s movement there. EFC volunteer Sarah McCarthy writes about the famous “condom train” where a number of women brazenly brought condoms into the Republic of Ireland on the train from Belfast.

In May 1971, 47 women gathered at Connolly Station in Dublin, prepared to embark on a potentially dangerous endeavour to purchase contraceptives across the border. These feminists had planned an ingenious publicity-stunt; they were going to buy mass amounts of condoms and contraceptive pills, and challenge the customs officers on their return to arrest them for importing these illegal items. It was a bold move in the 1970's, and many were terrified about what their mothers would think.

Upon their arrival in Belfast, they ran into one slight problem; contraception was so taboo in Ireland, that even most of these feminist women had never seen it in their lives. When Nell McCafferty, one of the founders of the Irish Women’s Liberation Movement, reached the pharmacy counter, she had no idea what to ask for. Eventually one of the divorced women in the group stepped up to the counter and requested condoms. However, at his point it dawned on them that the customs officials would have no idea what contraception looked like either. So they ordered hundreds of packs of aspirin, put them in paper bags, and pretended that they were contraceptive pills. Jubilantly, they got the train back to Dublin. As they neared the city, a few began to get nervous. What if they got sent to jail? What would their mothers say?! They clutched the statements they had prepared to hand to whoever would come to arrest them. However, the customs men were so mortified by their transgression that they quickly admitted that they couldn’t arrest them all, and let them go without challenge. The women walked through the station victoriously waving the contraband around, with some blowing up condoms like balloons. The response across Ireland was explosive, and the day’s impact lingered for decades.

The Irish Women's Liberation Movement in 1971.

 Women in Ireland have long been subjugated by a deeply patriarchal state and the pervasive influence of the Catholic Church. In the 1920's the colloquial term for birth control was “race suicide” and “a child every year to you” a popular blessing. By the 1970’s, laws from decades back still governed women’s bodies. The 1929 Censorship of Publications Act allowed a board of five men to prohibit the sale of any “indecent or obscene” literature; including that which advocated birth control. The 1935 Criminal Law (Amendment) Act made the import or sale of any contraceptive illegal. Married women were expected to have as many children as possible and women who had children outside of marriage were often incarcerated in institutions run by nuns, called the Magdalene Laundries. Any promotion of contraception was also banned, leaving people woefully and dangerously misinformed. In the late 1940’s, a baby was born in Dublin with the top of a Guinness bottle on its head; the mother had inserted it in herself hoping it would act as a contraceptive. As women’s groups began to recognise the importance of accessing contraception, the Church vigorously resisted their demands. In 1968 the Vatican passed a Papal Encyclical, entitled “Humane Vitae”, which forbade Catholics from using artificial contraception. At the time of the condom train, a doctor could only prescribe the pill to a married woman with an irregular menstrual cycle. The criminalisation of contraception meant that women had no control over the number and spacing of their children; power over their reproduction lay in the hands of a patriarchal state. Thus the fight for contraception was one of the key battles for women’s liberation.

In 1969 the Irish Women’s Liberation Movement and the Irish Family Planning Association (IFPA) were founded. They began to take direct action against contraception restrictions. In 1970 the IFPA began to give talks on contraceptives to women’s groups, despite the fact that even the promotion of contraception remained illegal. Soon after, Students’ Unions and Family Planning Clinics began to sell condoms illegally. They continued to do so against fines and public pressure. Many women’s groups pursued legal and extra-legal means to publicise and agitate for the urgent need for freely available contraception. The condom train was one amongst many bold and creative actions which openly flouted the prevailing conservative hegemony.

In 1979 the Health (Family Planning) Bill was published, which allowed married couples to access contraception with a prescription. But it was not until 1993 that all restrictions around the sale of condoms were removed, and the morning-after-pill only became available without prescription in 2011. Arguably, the contraceptive revolution of the 1960’s and 70’s, and its long-reaching consequences, had a bigger impact on women’s lives than the right to vote. By 1991 the average fertility rate had plummeted to 1.89. Women gained partial control over their bodies, and much more control over their own destiny.

Today, the fight for reproductive rights for women in Ireland is far from over. Abortion remains illegal, bar in certain exceptional circumstances. However, the horrific death of Savita Halappanavar has crystallised the pro-choice movement in Ireland, and I have no doubt that another struggle of direct action and mounting public pressure will eventually result in further gains for women in Ireland. Perhaps it is time to devise the Abortion Train!

A very sinister hijacking of Savita Halappanavar's death

A guest blog from the unstoppable Farzana: dedicated to the memory of Savita Halappanavar

“Bigotry tries to keep truth safe in its hands with a grip that kills it” Rabindranath Tagore, (1861 – 1941)

When I read Praveen’s (Savita’s widower) account of the agony his wife was in and the reaction of the consultant when Savita asked for the pregnancy to be induced (as the fetus was unviable) I was angry and humiliated for the Halappanavars who were told “This is a Catholic country.”  A few tweeters noted the inherent racism within that response, @sunny_hundal for one, @SamAmbreen for two - and a whole host of others. However, when this was pointed out during the night and the next day, a very typical response came from certain people who refused to acknowledge that that statement could be perceived as being racist. We were accused of being “over-sensitive”, “reading too much into it” etc...

What I would say to those people is this: imagine you were Savita and Praveen. Savita was in agony by the time her cervix had dilated and both she and her husband were undoubtedly traumatised and upset that they were to lose their first child, thousands of miles away from home, away from the comfort of the familiar. Now imagine, as foreign, non-Irish, non-Catholic people that the medical intervention you have requested in good faith is effectively rejected and done so in a sneering condescending manner. Imagine if your daily lived reality is one of “being the other”.

If you haven’t experienced racism in its obnoxious and subtle forms then one could see how you might not relate to how those of us similar to the Halappanavars would legitimately react. Being generous, I will give you the benefit of the doubt. Being miserly; I would say this: if you do not know what it is like to be of non-white skin colour, if you do not know what it is like to be judged for worshipping God in a different form, if you don’t have the same ethno-linguistic or cultural norms or values as the majority, if you are made to feel as if your non-white skin colour, your different form of worshipping God, your different ethno-linguistic-cultural norms are INFERIOR; then you do not know what it was like for Savita and Praveen at that time. You get me bredrens?

Predictably, a small but highly vocal racist group of anti-choice odds and sods have attempted to hijack the death of Savita and gone to town with some very strange views: views which fetishise the fetus but hate the brown mother.

One of the earliest tweets I spotted stated this: “The baby Savita (rip) lost was female. Many Indian people abort female babies. 2 facts”. In fact, according to her brother she had ‘always wanted to have a girl.’

My head sort of exploded about this time. I had a sinking feeling that the most uninformed anti-choicers would use the ethnicity of Savita as a tool in their disastrous counter campaign against a very angry and grief-stricken pro-choice movement.

Claims about Indians and sex-selective abortions are a cheap way to attack Savita’s Indian heritage, MY heritage, as one which is violently disproportionate in favour of men. However, if you consider that India (1966 & 1980), Sri Lanka (1960* the first female head of a modern post-colonial state), Pakistan (1988 and 1993), and Bangladesh - the “Battling Begums”  (1991, 2001, 1996, 2009) all have had female heads of state far earlier than any western country did (including the UK with Thatcher in 1979 and Mary Robinson in Ireland in 1990), you have to wonder – for countries which are portrayed as being so patriarchal and male dominated – we didn’t too badly did we bredrens? The most disturbing commentary on Savita’s death however has come from a well known active hardline anti-choice racist/White Nationalist. a link to his view that ‘Indian people are a bit slow and backward' is here.

First of all his views hardly make any logical sense. To claim that Indians are “slow and backward” when India is 10th largest economy in the world, 3rd for purchasing power, exports worth $299.4 billion. He then goes on to argue if Indians don’t like the way things are done in Ireland, then they “should go back to their smelly overpopulated country.” Overpopulated? Hang on – in the same diatribe, he argues that there is “no justification to allow the murdering of unborn babies.” I would also have to say, bredren, plenty of Irish people leave Ireland too to look for jobs abroad...and to get away from racist bumbaholes like you.

Another tweeter – a silly little boy who clearly doesn’t get out much, doesn’t read a quality newspaper or listen to the news – claimed that:  “That Muslim girl died, she was refused an abortion, am not racist but I f-ing hate smelly rag heads.” After I had picked myself up off the floor laughing hard at his “That Muslim girl,” (Savita was HINDU), I again felt the unease that racists, stupids and anti-choicers make for an explosive amount of stupidly uninformed bigoted views. That Savita was Indian, means that her ethnicity WILL be a factor in their frothy mouthed bigotry. I actually tweeted back “you do realise the woman who you implied as being a smelly rag head was in fact Hindu and not Muslim? PS I'm a smelly rag head.” I await his response, if any.

Savita’s death was horrible enough. Praveen, her husband, will arrive back in Ireland to fight for justice for his wife. A fitting legacy to Savita’s memory would be if Ireland would just reconsider their current legislation and make the necessary changes to ensure that no woman: whether white, brown, Catholic or non-Catholic is ever told “This is a Catholic country” as justification to deny a life- saving medical intervention.

Pro-choice is more pro-life than the anti-choicers would have you believe. Reclaim the term, we OWN it.

Updated: For London based people, there will be a protest outside the Irish embassy on Saturday 17th November 4pm onwards, for further details: http://www.abortionrights.org.uk/

Myth-Busting Monday - 'Abortion is legal in all parts of the UK'

Every Monday EFC busts myths and take names, cutting through the misinformation, disinformation, and straight up nonsense to bring you the facts. Today’s myth-bust relates to the fpa’s current abortion campaign Time For Change.

Although abortion is legal and accessible (though not available ‘on demand’) in England, Scotland and Wales, it is allowed in Northern Ireland only under exceptional circumstances. The 1967 Abortion Act, which governs abortion provision in Britain, only applies in England, Scotland and Wales. When the Act was debated and passed by Parliament in 1967 it was not extended to Northern Ireland.

Last year, over a thousand women from Northern Ireland travelled to England and Wales to obtain a legal abortion. Although women in Northern Ireland pay UK taxes they are not entitled to an abortion free on the NHS so would need to raise funds for the procedure itself (as well as travel and possibly accommodation). Abortion is also restricted in the Republic of Ireland and the Channel Islands so a number of women from these places travel to England and Wales to have abortions (see the 2010 abortion statistics for exact numbers).

There are no recorded statistics on the amount of illegal abortions taking place in Northern Ireland, but there have been reports of women ordering abortion medication online via services like Women on Web. The Abortion Support Network has been set up to provide financial assistance to those women travelling from Ireland, Northern Ireland, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man. 

For more information on abortion in Northern Ireland check out the fpa’s Time For Change campaign.