Abortion Must be Safe, Legal and, Importantly, Local

22 February 2019

In the January 2019 issue of BMJ Sexual & Reproductive Health, Aiken et al.¹ offer us a stark reminder of the toxic consequences wrought by the criminalisation of abortion.

The qualitative study was conducted using in-depth interviews with Northern Irish women who have experienced induced abortion. The stories told by these women are those of fear: fear of arrest, fear of being found out, fear of being denied an abortion. These stories will be familiar to anyone who has worked in a setting where abortion is criminalised, and indeed will be familiar to anyone who worked in the UK before the 1967 Abortion Act was passed.

These women remind us of the universal truth that abortion cannot be banned; only rendered unsafe. They tell us about trying to take toxic levels of vitamin C, drinking castor oil and vodka, or asking their partners to assault them to induce abortion because they do not have access to the funds to travel outside of Northern Ireland.

The study period spans a time of change in the UK when policy relaxed to allow Northern Irish women to access National Health Service (NHS)-funded abortion in Scotland, England and Wales. Despite this, the study illustrates the barriers to travel that exist in getting from Northern Ireland to Britain – needing a passport for certain air carriers, the cost of short-notice flights, having to conceal travel from partners, family members, children and employers, and so on.

The article’s findings reiterate what women and abortion care providers know, and what politicians and service commissioners need to learn, namely that abortion must be safe, legal and local.

The open access article can be read here: https://srh.bmj.com/content/45/1/3

Consider writing to your Member of Parliament (MP) to ask them to support decriminalisation in Northern Ireland by clicking on the following links: https://nowforni.uk/email/ or https://www.writetothem.com.

John Reynolds-Wright, BSACP Trainee Representative and Clinical Research Fellow, MRC Centre for Reproductive Health, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK. Email: jjrw@doctors.org.uk. Twitter: doctorjjrw

Reference

1  Aiken ARA, Padron E, Broussard K, et al. The impact of Northern Ireland’s abortion laws on women’s abortion decision-making and experiences. BMJ Sex Reprod Health 2019;45:3-9.