Abortion in Ireland: committee votes for constitutional change

A committee set up to deliberate on Ireland’s strict abortion regime has voted for the constitutional rules to be changed.

The Citizens’ Assembly, a randomly selected group of 99 members of the public chaired by the supreme court judge Mary Laffoy, met on Saturday to discuss the contentious issue for the final time.

At the heart of the assembly’s work is examining the eighth amendment to the republic’s constitution, which gives equal right to life to the mother and the foetus. In the first of a series of votes by members on whether to advise constitutional reform, the assembly voted 87% in favour of change.

A series of other votes are being held over the weekend to determine the specific changes the assembly will recommend.

Since 2014 in Ireland, a pregnancy can be terminated under the Protection Of Life During Pregnancy Act if there is a risk to the woman’s life, including from suicide. The procedure can involve a medical or surgical termination, or an early delivery by induction or caesarean section.

There has been a strong campaign for women to be allowed to have an abortion in cases of rape and incest, or if there has been a fatal foetal abnormality diagnosis.

Figures from the Health Service Executive showed 26 terminations were carried out under the legislation in 2014 and again in 2015. In both years, 14 were because of a risk to the life of the mother from physical illness, three in relation to suicide and nine following emergencies arising from physical illness.

In 2013, Amanda Mellet became the first of three Irish women to formally ask the UN to denounce the prohibition on abortions in cases of fatal foetal abnormalities as “cruel and inhumane”.

Mellet and her husband took their case to the UN’s human rights committee after they were forced to go to England to terminate the pregnancy.

Last year the UNHRC ruled that by forcing Mellet to leave Ireland to have an abortion, the state had inflicted trauma and distress on her.

For the first time in its history, Ireland compensated Mellet as a result of the ruling. Under the country’s laws, if Mellet and the other two women had remained in the republic they would have been forced to give birth to stillborn babies.

On Saturday, Judge Laffoy said the result of the vote provided a mandate for changing the status quo and, if implemented by the government, it would require a constitutional referendum, the Irish Times reported.

Opening the session, she praised the commitment of the assembly members.

“This exercise in deliberative democracy allowed us to withdraw from the polarising perspectives and begin first and foremost with the facts.”

Abortion in Ireland: committee votes for constitutional change

Northern Ireland police raided premises searching for abortion pills

The Police Service of Northern Ireland raided two premises on International Women’s Day searching for abortion pills that are illegal in the region.

No pills were found during searches last week, including one at a workshop belonging to Belfast pro-choice campaigner Helen Crickard. Crickard said she felt “violated and humiliated” over the raids on her premises in South Belfast.

The PSNI confirmed on Monday that the raids had taken place. Det Supt Bobby Singleton stressed that abortion was a “sensitive issue that divides opinion within society”.

However, Singleton added that where an offence has been committed, the PSNI had a duty to bring offenders to justice.

Unlike the rest of the UK, doctors cannot prescribe abortion pills in Northern Ireland.

Singleton said: “Offences of procurement of an abortion are outlined in Sections 58 & 59 of the Offences against the Person Act 1861 and Child Destruction Sect 25 (1) Criminal Justice (NI) Act.

“These offences can reasonably be suspected in circumstances where persons order prescription medications which are known to be used or advertised as suitable for inducing an abortion.”

Last year three women handed themselves into a police station in Derry, stating they had procured and taken illegal abortion pills and requested that they be prosecuted, in protest at Northern Ireland’s restrictive abortion laws. Since then, pro-choice campaigners have continued to challenge the PSNI to arrest them after they admitted purchasing abortion pills for other women in Northern Ireland.

Also in 2016, a 21-year-old woman was given a suspended prison sentence for buying drugs online to induce a miscarriage. She had been reported by her flatmates after they found out she had taken the abortion pills leading to a termination.

A mother is also facing prosecution for procuring abortion pills for her then underage daughter who fell pregnant.

Women in Northern Ireland who want to terminate a pregnancy can either travel to England or Wales for an abortion at a cost of around £1,000-£2,000. Northern Ireland residents are not eligible for the procedure on the NHS and have to pay for private treatment, as well as the cost of the flight and hotels.

Alternatively women at an early stage of pregnancy can buy mifepristone and misoprostol pills online, for around £60; the pills are considered safe and reliable in the first 10 weeks of pregnancy. As well as buying the pills on the internet, pro-choice campaigners have also flown the drugs into Northern Ireland via drones.

Northern Ireland police raided premises searching for abortion pills

Nestlé to remove 10% of sugar from all snacks in UK and Ireland by 2018

Nestlé, one of the world’s biggest chocolate manufacturers, will take 10% of the sugar out of its confectionery in the UK and Ireland by 2018.

The corporation says the cut is from the levels existing in its sugary products in 2015 and will amount to about 7,500 tonnes. It makes several well-known brands, including Aero, Dairy Box, Drifter, KitKat, Lion, Milkybar, Munchies, Polo, Quality Street, Rolo, Smarties, Toffee Crisp, Walnut Whip and Yorkie.

The announcement follows public concern over the quantity of sugar in the country’s diet and its contribution to rising obesity levels. The threat of a sugar levy on soft drinks has encouraged the reformulation of Irn Bru and Lucozade, which will escape the tax, although there have been no such moves by PepsiCo or Coca-Cola. There is no proposed tax on sugar in food, but the government has hinted it might come if the country’s sugar intake is not reduced.

Nestlé says it will not use artificial sweeteners in its confectionery. Instead it plans to replace sugar with higher quantities of existing ingredients or other, non-artificial ingredients and ensuring products are below a certain amount of calories.

Reduced sizes are likely to be one of the options, and it is possible that a certain amount of sugar can be taken out without affecting the taste much.

“The 10% reduction is not a case of a straight swap of sugar for another ingredient – it will be achieved in a number of different ways so that we can make sure that the taste is as good or better from product to product,” a spokesperson said.

“We are not announcing specific changes to brands at this stage but over the coming months and years we will introduce revised products that make incremental reductions on sugar in different ways that, when added up, make a big difference overall to the nation’s diet while still maintaining taste.”

In November, Nestlé announced it had made a key breakthrough in food science that would allow it to reduce sugar by up to 40%. It claimed its scientists had found a way to “structure sugar differently”.

In the latest announcement, Fiona Kendrick chair and chief executive of Nestlé UK and Ireland, suggested this technological shift would be part of the answer.

“These innovations will help us to reduce sugar in confectionery when they are combined with other, more common methods like reformulating recipes and swapping sugar for other non-artificial ingredients,” she said.

Public Health England, which is charged with encouraging companies to reformulate their products, welcomed the announcement.

“Nestlé is the latest household name to commit to making everyday products healthier and we’re delighted this is just the start of its efforts,” said Duncan Selbie, PHE’s chief executive.

“This sends a clear message that reducing sugar in food is possible, even in products that are typically harder to reformulate.”

Nestlé to remove 10% of sugar from all snacks in UK and Ireland by 2018

Ireland to legalise cannabis for specific medical conditions

Ireland is set to legalise the use of cannabis for treating specific medical conditions, after a report commissioned by the government said the drug could be given to some patients with certain illnesses.

The Irish health minister, Simon Harris, said he would support the use of medical cannabis “where patients have not responded to other treatments and there is some evidence that cannabis may be effective”.

The report said cannabis could be given to patients with a range of illnesses including multiple sclerosis and severe epilepsy, and to offset the effects of chemotherapy.

“I believe this report marks a significant milestone in developing policy in this area,” Harris said. “This is something I am eager to progress but I am also obligated to proceed on the basis of the best clinical advice.”

Last November, Harris asked Ireland’s Health Products Regulatory Authority (HPRA) to examine the latest evidence on cannabis for medical use and how schemes to facilitate this operate in other countries.

The study found “an absence of scientific data demonstrating the effectiveness of cannabis products” and warned of “insufficient information on [the drug’s] safety during long-term use for the treatment of chronic medical conditions”.

“The scientific evidence supporting the effectiveness of cannabis across a large range of medical conditions is in general poor, and often conflicting,” it added.

However, it added that any decision on legalising use of cannabis was ultimately for society and the government to make.

Harris said he wanted to set up a “a compassionate access programme for cannabis-based treatments” and was now considering any changes in the law needed for its operation.

The new medical cannabis scheme will run for five years and will be constantly monitored by Irish health service experts.

The big policy shift came in the same week that the Fine Gael-led coalition in Dublin backed the idea of a “safe injection” room for heroin addicts in Ireland’s capital.

The Temple Bar Company, which represents bars, clubs, restaurants and other businesses in the cultural-entertainment quarter on the south bank of the Liffey in Dublin, expressed opposition to locating any of the injection centres in or close to the tourist district.

The Temple Bar chief executive, Martin Harte, said businesses in the tourist centre collected 1,500 syringes from the streets around the area every year.

“We are bracing ourselves for an increase in the level of syringe disposals and related antisocial behaviour,” he said.

“Addiction centres make no provision for what happens outside of opening hours … The Temple Bar Company is not opposed to tackling issues with drugs in Ireland, but we are opposed to proposals that exacerbate and fuel an injecting epidemic in Dublin city.”

Last year, Aodhán Ó Ríordáin, the former Irish Labour party junior health minister, became the first politician to call publically for a safe injection centre for the more than 20,000 registered heroin addicts in Dublin alone.

Ó Ríordáin also said he favoured making the possession of heroin, cocaine or other opiates for personal use no longer an arrestable offence.

Although he is no longer in government, after last year’s election, Ó Ríordáin’s suggestion of partial decriminalisation of drugs among users won the backing of rank-and-file police officers in Ireland, who said it would free up resources.

Ireland to legalise cannabis for specific medical conditions

Anti-abortion report challenges law reform in Northern Ireland

A report by anti-abortion campaigners in Northern Ireland has claimed that 100,000 people were born in the region because the 1967 Abortion Act was never extended to the province.

The Both Lives Matter report published on Wednesday comes as the former justice minister in Northern Ireland confirmed this week that he will resubmit his private member’s bill in the next Stormont assembly calling on the new devolved parliament to legalise abortions in cases of fatal foetal abnormalities where the pregnancies are doomed.

Dawn McAvoy of Both Lives Matter said: “The debate around abortion is in danger of becoming polarised by those only concerned with the unborn child on the one hand and those solely concerned with the rights of the women on the other. The reality is that both lives matter.”

“There are people alive in Northern Ireland today who would not have been born if the 1967 Abortion Act had been introduced here. People we all know and love – spouses, children, friends and family.”

“We estimate that there are 100,000 people alive today, who would not be, had we introduced the 1967 Abortion Act.

The group’s report comes at a time when the battle lines are being redrawn over abortion in Northern Ireland, the only part of the UK where the procedure is banned in almost all circumstances except when there is a direct threat to the mother’s life.

Thousands of Northern Irish women are forced to travel across to England to terminate their pregnancies due to the near-total ban.

David Ford, the former leader of the cross-community Alliance Party, who was justice minister in the regional government before it collapsed on Monday, has vowed to continue to press for abortion reform.

He said that in the next parliament after the scheduled elections on 2 March, there would be another private members bill calling on assembly members to liberalise the near-total ban on abortion.

Ford said: “Should the people of South Antrim re-elect me to the position of their MLA, on my first day back I will go to the Speaker’s office and resubmit my bill, with a view to progressing it through the next assembly term.”

The Both Lives Matter campaign is being backed by the former police ombudsman in Northern Ireland Nuala O’Loan, who said extreme cases of crisis pregnancies were being used to push a pro-abortion agenda.

Lady O’Loan said: “There is an urgent requirement at a time when heart-rending cases are being extensively utilised by those seeking to diminish legal protection for the unborn, to be more focused on recognising and providing for the needs and care of both mother and child. ‘Both Lives Matter’ is an excellent response to that pressing need.”

The group has also won the support of economist Esmond Birnie, a former adviser to ex-first minister and Nobel peace prize winner David Trimble.

Both Lives Matters said it is a new collaborative movement of individuals and organisations seeking to reframe the abortion debate in Northern Ireland.

In 2015 a high court judge in Belfast ruled that Northern Ireland’s almost outright ban on abortion breaches the human rights of women and girls, including rape victims. The ruling is being challenged by the province’s attorney general John Larkin.

At least 1,000 women and girls from Northern Ireland travel to hospitals in Britain for terminations every year.For instance, official figures for 2013 suggest 800 Northern Irish pregnancies were terminated in Britain – although that number is regarded as an underestimate. Among the 800 was that of a 13-year-old who became pregnant through incest.

The only law applying to abortion in Northern Ireland is the Offences Against the Persons Act 1861, which contains a life sentence for anyone convicted of carrying out a termination even in cases of rape or incest.

Anti-abortion report challenges law reform in Northern Ireland

Ireland compensates woman forced to travel to Britain for an abortion

Ireland has for the first time in its history compensated a woman for the trauma caused by forcing her to travel to Britain for an abortion.

Pro-choice campaigners in the Republic said the Fine Gael-led minority government’s agreement on Wednesday to pay compensation to Amanda Mellet was highly significant.

Mellet and her husband James took their case all the way to the UN’s Human Rights Committee after the couple were forced to obtain a termination of her pregnancy in England.

In 2013 Amanda Mellet became the first of three Irish women to formally ask the UN to denounce the prohibition on abortions in cases of fatal foetal abnormalities as “cruel and inhumane”.

Under Ireland’s strict anti-abortion laws, if Mellet and the other two women had remained in the Republic they would have been forced to give birth to babies who would be born dead.

Campaigners arguing for a referendum to repeal an amendment to the Irish Constitution that gives full citizenship rights to the embryo after conception welcomed today’s decision by the Dublin government.

Ailbhe Smyth, convenor of the Coalition to Repeal the Eighth Amendment and a long-time campaigner on reproductive rights, said: “To the best of my knowledge, this is the first time ever that the Irish government has compensated a woman for having to leave the country for an abortion. This is long overdue acknowledgement of the profound denial of women’s right to autonomy in this country.”

“The government must immediately ensure no other woman suffers similar human rights violations. The eighth amendment is a profound source of discrimination and national shame for Ireland. It is simply not good enough to pass the book to the Citizen’s Assembly and not make any commitment to undertake the necessary constitutional and legislative reforms to end, once and for all, Ireland’s violation of international human rights law and obligations under human rights conventions and treaties.

“We cannot, as a country, continue to oversee the violation of women’s human rights. We’re saying that women deserve better and Ireland can do much better.”

In June the UNHCR ruled that by forcing Amanda Mellet to leave Ireland for an abortion in Britain, the Irish state had inflicted trauma and distress on her.

Irish Labour party senator and long term campaigner for abortion reform in Ireland Ivana Bacik said the government’s decision to accept the UNHCR ruling was a crucial step towards changing Ireland’s abortion regime.

The Trinity College Dublin law lecturer said: “The UN Human Rights Committee’s ruling in June of this year constituted an important acknowledgement that the highly restrictive Irish law on abortion violates the human rights of women. The government’s acceptance of the ruling through the announcement of the compensation award, and Minister Harris’s sincerity in apologising to Ms Mellet, are both welcome.

“But we need now to see official recognition that thousands of other women are being denied their basic human rights through being denied access to legal abortion in Ireland, due to the eighth amendment to the constitution. The UNHCR ruling in favour of Ms Mellet made clear the need for us to hold a referendum to repeal the eighth amendment.”

Ireland compensates woman forced to travel to Britain for an abortion

Northern Ireland woman takes NHS to court over abortion law

A Northern Irish teenager who as a fifteen year old had to go to England to terminate a pregnancy, is challenging the NHS’s refusal to fund abortions for women from the region in the supreme court on Wednesday.

The health service has so far refused to pay for abortions for women from Northern Ireland who travel to England for terminations.

The girl, identified as “A”, and her mother are appealing to the supreme court to force the NHS to fund abortions. Their lawyers have described the refusal to financially help women from Northern Ireland who are in crisis pregnancies as “perverse and unlawful”.

Abortion is only available in Northern Ireland’s hospitals when there is a direct threat to the mother’s life if the pregnancy continues. In all other cases abortion is illegal.

Last November, a high court judge ruled that, as it stands, Northern Ireland’s abortion laws violate the rights of women and girls in cases of fatal foetal abnormalities or where a pregnancy is the result of a sexual crime.

An estimated 2,000 women travel to English hospitals and clinics from Northern Ireland every year to have terminations. All of these women have to raise money to go to private clinics in England for abortions.

There is strong opposition to liberalising the province’s strict anti-abortion laws across the floor of the Northern Ireland assembly. The 1967 Abortion Act was never extended to Northern Ireland, and a bid to ease the country’s termination laws to include cases of fatal foetal abnormalities and pregnancy via sexual crime was rejected earlier this year.

In the supreme court on Wednesday judges will be told that in 2012, then 15-year old “A travelled to Manchester from Northern Ireland with her mother (B), where she paid £600 for an abortion, on top of £300 in travel costs.

They received charitable assistance from the Abortion Support Network in the sum of £400 without which they could not have afforded the treatment. A and B have since argued in the high court and court of appeal that the cost of the treatment should have been free for them as UK citizens, and that by not enacting this change, Jeremy Hunt, the secretary of state for health, has failed in his duty to make NHS procedures reasonably available.

Abortion in Northern Ireland: ‘Why don’t we trust women to make the right choice?’

Angela Jackman, a partner at law firm Simpson Millar, has been representing A & B throughout the legal process.

Jackman said: “For women in Northern Ireland who are pregnant and seek a termination, the status quo is almost unbearable. I believe the legal arguments of the secretary of State are perverse and contrary to its international obligations. Many women face the choice between an unlawful termination using dangerous and illegal pills, with the prospect of prosecution to follow, or a costly journey to England where they must pay privately for an abortion. For many women, those costs are prohibitive.”

She continued: “This is the end of a long and significant domestic journey. I am pleased that the issue is finally being given due consideration by the supreme court, the importance of which cannot be underestimated.”

The supreme court has recently granted six national charities the right to intervene in the A and B case.

The British Pregnancy Advisory Service, the Family Planning Association, Alliance for Choice, Abortion Support Network, Birthright and the British Humanist Association have been granted permission to provide their perspectives on the issue in the supreme cCourt hearing.

Jackman added: “I am pleased that the court has permitted these six charities to provide submissions in this case. Through their efforts in providing advice and assistance to women like ‘A’, and campaigning for the reproductive choices of women, these charities can offer invaluable insight into the reality of the situation for the court’s consideration.”

The British Humanist Association’s director of public affairs and policy, Pavan Dhaliwal, said denying women from Northern Ireland in crisis pregnancies support was putting their lives at risk.

“Our government’s stance in refusing women from Northern Ireland safe and legal abortion on the NHS is shameful and we believe it is a breach of human rights laws. The supreme court judges have an opportunity to rectify a situation which currently causes undue distress to hundreds of women and leaves many more with no choice but to buy illegal abortion pills online,” he said.

The case will concern A and B versus the secretary of state for health. The arguments will be heard in front of five judges at the one-day hearing.

Northern Ireland woman takes NHS to court over abortion law

Three in five people in Northern Ireland want abortion decriminalised

Nearly 60% of people in Northern Ireland believe abortion in the province should be decriminalised, a new survey has found. When asked whether abortion should be permitted for victims of rape, and in cases where the foetus cannot survive outside the womb, three-quarters of those polled agreed.

Northern Ireland is the only part of the UK where abortion is illegal, except in the limited circumstances where continuing a pregnancy would put the mother’s life in direct danger. The 1861 Offences Against the Persons Act, which makes abortion a criminal offence, is punishable by a life sentence in prison.

Attempts by individual members of the Northern Ireland assembly to introduce limited abortion reform in the Stormont parliament have been met by opposition from the biggest party, the Democratic Unionists, as well as members of the nationalist Social Democratic and Labour party.

The public attitudes survey was conducted last month by local pollsters Millward Brown on behalf of Amnesty International, which backs abortion reform in Northern Ireland. The polling of 1,000 adults, carried out in September, found:

• 72% of people think abortion should be available if the pregnancy is the result of rape or incest; only 15% are opposed.

• 67% of people think abortion should be available in cases of fatal foetal abnormality; just 17% are opposed.

• 58% of people think abortion should be decriminalised so that there would be no criminal penalty for women who have abortions in Northern Ireland; 22% are opposed to this change.

• 59% of people think abortion should be decriminalised so there would be no criminal penalty for doctors and medical staff who assist women to have abortions in Northern Ireland; 21% are opposed to this change.

• 68% of people think the fact that in most cases abortion is classified as a crime in Northern Ireland adds to the distress of women seeking an abortion; 14% disagree.

• 75% of people think the fact that women from Northern Ireland who are seeking a lawful abortion must travel to Britain adds to their distress; 11% disagree.

Adrianne Peltz, Amnesty International’s Northern Ireland campaigner, said the findings reflected how the people were ahead of politicians in terms of liberalising abortion laws.

“These poll findings demonstrate an overwhelming demand for change to Northern Ireland’s draconian abortion laws,” she said. “This is not a small margin of support for women’s access to abortion – it’s a definitive landslide. Northern Ireland has changed.

“Not only do a huge majority of people in Northern Ireland want to see abortion made available to women and girls in the tragic circumstances of rape, incest or fatal foetal diagnosis, but they also want to see abortion decriminalised for all women. It’s time for these outdated laws to be brought into the 21st century.

“Decisions about women’s bodies should be made by women themselves, never by politicians, who should be aware that voters from all parties – including those who have previously blocked change – want to see a radical overhaul of these inhumane laws.”

Last November, Northern Ireland’s high court ruled that the region’s restrictive abortion laws breached the European convention on human rights in cases of fatal foetal abnormality and where the pregnancy resulted from sexual assault. The Northern Ireland executive has appealed against the judgment and a decision from the court of appeal is pending.

In April this year, a 21-year-old Northern Irish woman was given a three-month suspended prison sentence after being found guilty of taking abortion pills to end her pregnancy. The court was told that the woman, aged 19 at the time of the offence, could not afford to travel to England to have a lawful abortion.

On Tuesday, Amnesty International activists will hand over a petition of more than 45,000 names to the Northern Ireland executive at Stormont calling for a loosening of anti-abortion laws in the region.

Three in five people in Northern Ireland want abortion decriminalised

Home abortion kits backed by women who used them in Ireland

Women in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland who have obtained abortion pills online in defiance of the law overwhelmingly express gratitude and relief that they were able to end an unwanted pregnancy, a new study shows.

Their only regret, according to a paper published in the British Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, is that they are having to do something that is illegal in their country. They express anger and disappointment that they could not access a safe, legal abortion and felt they were treated as second-class citizens.

“Abortion is a huge decision for some women to make. It’s shameful that we are met with brick walls and judgment in our own country,” said one.

Abortion is illegal in both countries but since 2006, the Netherlands-based organisation Women on Web has been offering medical consultations online and dispatching in the post the two pills – mifepristone and misoprostol – that will terminate a pregnancy within the first 10 weeks.

The organisation offers the service around the world and has seen a sharp increase in women seeking help from countries in Latin America, where abortion is also illegal, after the link was made between Zika virus infection in pregnancy and brain damage in babies.

Packages shipped to Ireland are stopped, so women travel to Northern Ireland to collect them instead. It is not illegal to buy or sell the drugs, but it is to use them to bring about an abortion.

In April, a woman in Northern Ireland who took the pills and was reported to the police by her two flatmates was given a three-month suspended sentence by Belfast crown court. The case sparked protests and demonstrations of solidarity from other women who announced they too had resorted to the abortion pills and challenged police to arrest them.

Women with an unwanted pregnancy in Ireland previously had to travel to the UK if they wanted to have an abortion. Between 1970 and 2015, 180,797 women from Ireland and 61,311 women from Northern Ireland made the journey. Many still do rather than break the law by bringing about an abortion at home.

But the study, carried out by Abigail Aiken and her colleagues at the University of Texas at Austin, found that many of the women who went online for help could not afford to travel or to take time off work or the costs of childcare.

“These barriers create a stark health inequity: women with financial and social resources can access offshore termination of pregnancy, while women who lack such resources cannot,” says the paper.

The study found that 5,650 women sought help from the site between 2010 and 2015. Most (85%) were between 20 and 30 years old and were mothers (63%).

The most common reason for choosing to terminate pregnancy (reported by 62% of women) was not being able to cope with a child at that point in their lives. Nearly half – 44% – cited having no money to provide for a child, and 23% felt their family was already complete. Nearly a third – 30% – felt they were too young to have a child or wanted to finish their education.

Almost all – 97% – said they felt accessing and using the medication at home was the right thing for them and 98% said they would recommend it to other women in a similar situation. The most common feeling they reported after completing the procedure was relief (70%), followed by satisfaction (36%). Over a quarter – 26.8% – said they were happy and 22% said they were pleased. The vast majority – 94% – expressed gratitude that they could go online and obtain the pills.

“There is a very negative perception of a home abortion,” said Aiken, an Irish-born assistant professor at the US university. “People regard it as desperate and a last resort. But women say it is very helpful for their health, wellbeing and autonomy. The only negative thing is that they have to do it outside of the law.”

The website asks women to make a donation to its costs, suggesting €70 to €90. Over a third – 35% – said they found it difficult to find the money. Nearly a quarter (24%) said they did not get enough emotional support from family and friends.

One of the women surveyed told the researchers: “There is no way I could have afforded to travel to England, pay for the procedure, stay in a hotel, and have someone there to support me. Thanks to this service, I was able to have a safe abortion in an environment where I felt comfortable and with my partner there to support me. Thank you for enabling women to have control over their own bodies.”

Others said that without access to home abortion, they would have considered suicide. “I can’t thank you enough – you have saved my life,” said one. “I would have had to resort to desperate measures. You will never understand how grateful I am.”

Home abortion kits backed by women who used them in Ireland

Northern Ireland is happiest place in UK, finds wellbeing survey

Northern Ireland is the most contented region of the UK, while London is the most anxious and least satisfied, according to statistics on local wellbeing published on Tuesday.

It will be little comfort to stressed-out, dissatisfied Londoners that their overall satisfaction has improved faster than other parts of the country.

The survey by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), which is part of the larger labour force survey with 158,000 respondents, asks people to rate out of 10 their overall satisfaction with their life, the extent to which they feel things they do are worthwhile, how happy they felt yesterday, and how anxious they felt the previous day. The national data, published in July, shows wellbeing has improved each year since 2011, but this masks regional differences.

These differences are not large, but taken together they paint a nuanced national picture. In Northern Ireland, for example, people ranked their life satisfaction at 7.85 out of 10 on average. In London this was 7.51. Londoners rated their own anxiety at 3.04 out of 10, while those in the West Midlands put it at 2.75. Those in Northern Ireland put their happiness at 7.70, while for those in the north-east it was 7.36.

The data includes almost every local authority, but sample sizes for many are very small, meaning comparing the regional picture is more reliable. The Northamptonshire town of Corby came bottom on life satisfaction and worthwhile measurements. However this was based on responses from 80 people.

In London ‘the very poor and extremely rich live within sight of one another’. Photograph: Photofusion/Rex Shutterstock

The national “wellbeing index” was one of David Cameron’s flagship policies when he entered Downing Street. “It’s time we admitted that there’s more to life than money and it’s time we focused not just on GDP but on GWB – general wellbeing,” he said, and ordered the ONS to start gathering data.

Annie Quick, who leads inequality and wellbeing work at the New Economics Foundation, a thinktank that has championed the gathering of such data, said London’s gloom may be understandable. “There are real challenges about living in cities,” she said. “Commuting is very bad for wellbeing: the long periods of time spent travelling to work are … bad for our families, and bad for community cohesion.”

The deeply unequal nature of London, where the very poor and extremely rich live within sight of one another, adds to dissatisfaction, she added.

But Northern Ireland’s apparent contentment has the experts confused – one press officer blurted out, “Really?” when the Guardian explained the ONS’s findings.

Quick said: “Northern Ireland is really interesting: if you go to Northern Ireland and talk to them, they are very surprised. We don’t have the answer.”

The local authority of Mid and East Antrim in Northern Ireland tops the table on “life satisfaction” and “worthwhile” measures and is second on the “happiness” measure. Its mayor, Audrey Wales, said she was delighted with the finding.

“Ensuring the good health and wellbeing of our citizens is a key strategic aim for Mid and East Antrim borough council and we are delighted that this survey shows that we are certainly going in the right direction.”

She added: “With a rich heritage and culture, our borough is a beautiful, welcoming and unique place with a huge offering for its citizens and visitors alike. What sets us apart is our strong community spirit and the diversity of our citizens.”

Quick said the things that affect wellbeing are well known: good-quality housing and environment, stable jobs, and functioning communities. Simply asking people how happy they feel incorporates these factors, she said, but “it’s a very sensitive measure that picks up all sorts of other things … The challenge is for local authorities to look at those things.”

Dawn Snape, a quality of life officer at the ONS, said: “We have seen personal wellbeing improving on a UK-wide basis over the past five years. But today’s data paints a richer picture, enabling people to explore what’s been happening in their local area.

“This will help individuals, communities and local authorities to look at wellbeing locally alongside other more traditional measures of progress.”

Quick said the UK is a “world leader” at gathering these statistics. But she added: “We need to embed this thinking into devolution debates: these are often focusing on maximising economic growth but building the economy is a means to an end. What could be more important than making sure we have good quality of life?”

Northern Ireland is happiest place in UK, finds wellbeing survey

Abortion in Ireland: ‘Silence is breaking 12 hearts a day’

Ireland’s abortion regime has been responsible for a litany of tragedies in recent years. The death of Savita Hallapanavar, denied a life-saving abortion during her miscarriage; the state-sponsored abuse of Miss Y, a suicidal teenage asylum seeker and rape victim, forced to carry her pregnancy to viability and deliver by C-section; a brain-dead woman kept alive, effectively as an incubator, against her family’s wishes. And there are plenty more mundane, yet nonetheless heartbreaking, stories of approximately 12 women a day who travel to the UK to access abortion services.

In the last year, something fundamental has shifted. The Irish pro-choice movement is getting loud. Actors and writers including Tara Flynn, Helen Linehan and Susan Cahill have publicly shared their abortion stories, bravely breaking taboos. An “abortion bus” flouted the law to tour Ireland distributing medication. Comedian Gráinne Maguire had us all tweeting details of our periods to the taoiseach, Enda Kenny. Activist Anna Cosgrave designed distinctive Repeal jumpers, so that on any given day in Dublin you will see supporters with their commitment to repealing the 1983 eighth amendment to the constitution emblazoned across their chests. That’s just the tip of the iceberg.

The last two weeks have seen some of the most extraordinary activism yet in the campaign to repeal the eighth amendment. Under the Twitter handle @twowomentravel, two friends live-tweeted their journey to England so that one of them could access an abortion, turning a personal crisis into a powerful political action. Answering my questions, on the condition that her anonymity was preserved, the companion explained that while planning the journey her friend decided she wanted something good to come from it for Irish women.

“What’s the alternative?” she asks, “Silence? Silence is breaking 12 Irish hearts a day. Silence is trapping migrant women in desperate situations, silence has the blood of Savita on its hands, silence is the shape of Miss Y’s devastation. Silence has devastated the women and girls of Ireland, but now it’s time to talk, and get real.”

They certainly got real. The pictures they shared were striking in their ordinariness: boarding an airplane in the cold grey of dawn; views from taxi windows; waiting rooms with magazines; a basic hotel. They tagged Kenny in each. The most controversial image is a lightly bloodstained sheet, which they felt was important to show: they were certainly not the first women to face a long trek home, bleeding and sore.

“The anti-choice brigade have been all over that photo,” the friend tells me. “The realities of women’s bodies have been glossed over for too long. We bleed, and we birth, and it’s not pretty, but that’s life, and that reality needs to be brought to the fore. There’s no realism in the philosophical focus of the anti-choice side. They can speculate until the cows come home about when life begins. In fact, they have speculated so loudly and for so long that real lives of women and girls have ended unnecessarily.”

When #twowomentravel returned, 48 hours later, they had tens of thousands of Twitter followers and were making international headlines. “We could never have expected the response we received. It was surreal. Where do you even begin thanking people for standing with you in that situation?”

They believe that Kenny saw their tweets: “He stopped posting updates on the Olympics, which he had been doing regularly,” she says. In her view, Kenny going offline speaks volumes. In any case, they are not surprised by his silence.

“He has no compassion, no interest in the lives of women. There are more than 100,000 women who went before us. He could have listened to any number of them, and he didn’t. He owes over 3,000 women a year a whole lot of money and remorse.”

The #twowomentravel hashtag was brimming with gratitude and solidarity. But there were also, inevitably, anti-choice pundits aggressively shaming the women. “We were showing photos of waiting rooms, taxis, flights. In response, we got bombarded by violent rhetoric accusing both of us of murder, bombarded with pictures of mutilated foetuses.”

Perhaps the strangest criticism came from detractors who refused to believe that the anonymous women existed. Seemingly, even though a dozen women a day make this journey, the notion that one of them would refuse to be shamed into silence defies all logic.

The friend I interview is scathing of such critiques: “Nobody has to believe us. Our dignity does not rely on that. But I will say this: if you are sceptical of an eloquent, salient, honest and cutting telling of the travesty that faces so many Irish women, you are a sexist. If you doubt the ability of women to tell their stories with ferocity and confidence, even in crisis, you are a sexist. If you doubt us because we have succeeded in defying you, you are a sexist. We are not meek, and we owe no explanations.”

Right now, the friends are processing everything that has happened – one healing and taking time out following her abortion, the other dealing with media. They intend to keep fighting. “We have to break the hold of silence. We can no longer whisper. We have been failed for too long. Now is the time to be loud.”

Abortion in Ireland: ‘Silence is breaking 12 hearts a day’

Ireland calls for EU drug agency to be moved from London to Dublin

Ireland is set for a post-Brexit battle with five other EU countries to be the site of the new headquarters of the London-based European Medicines Agency (EMA).

The Irish health minister, Simon Harris, has said he will be pressing the case in Brussels for the relocation of the EMA, one of two key EU agencies that will move once Britain leaves the union.

“The minister has asked his officials to prepare for a bid to bring the EMA to Dublin. We will be making the case that Dublin offers significant advantages as a location, not least the advantage of the English language, a strong pharmaceutical and R&D sector presence,” said a spokeswoman for Harris.

Related: Brexit could lead to longer waiting times for new medicines, warn experts

Spain has already staked its claim to either the EMA or the European Banking Authority as part of a land grab in the aftermath of June’s EU referendum. Sweden, Denmark, Italy and Germany have also expressed interest in hosting the EMA.

Harris’s spokeswoman said officials in Dublin had “already begun laying the groundwork” and in September will seek a formal inter-departmental working group to flesh out Ireland’s bid.

The EMA, with a staff of 890, is the largest EU body in Britain and has overseen pan-European drug approvals since 1995 from its headquarters tucked away among global banks in London’s Canary Wharf.

Spain, which joined the EU in 1986, will argue that it is time it was considered for one of the more important EU institutions, and the EMA and European Banking Authority are two of the largest.

The EMA works with individual regulatory authorities from all 31 European Economic Area member countries.

Ireland calls for EU drug agency to be moved from London to Dublin