New website offers US women help to perform their own abortions

Fearful that Donald Trump’s presidency poses a once-in-a-generation threat to US reproductive rights, an international advocacy group this week is unveiling what is sure to be a controversial response: a web portal dedicated to helping US women terminate their own pregnancies with abortion-inducing drugs they have obtained outside of a medical setting.

The project, launched by Women Help Women, is a nod to the fact that many US women may already be taking matters into their own hands as abortion options in this country contract.

“Women in the US have been and are using the pills without good guidance,” said Susan Yanow, the US spokeswoman for the group, Women Help Women. “If a woman is anxious and has the pills in her hand, and doesn’t know what to do … we can help her understand what to do. We can help her understand what signs to look for, and what’s going on.”

Research suggests that there is a small but significant number of US women who attempt to induce their own abortions without any medical supervision.

Several studies have shown that many of these women, particularly those living along the US-Mexico border, are using misoprostol, a miscarriage-causing drug that can be legally purchased over the counter in many Central American pharmacies. In the US, it is illegal to administer the drug outside of certain medical clinics.

Rules for taking misoprostol are easy to find online. What Women Help Women has done differently is connect US women with counselors who can provide step-by-step instructions, and answer questions, in real time.

Their counselors are trained by medical professionals to walk women through the process of using misoprostol for a DIY abortion. Counselors will also strive to connect women with abortion funds if payment is the main obstacle for getting an abortion in a clinic.

But the main goal is to support the unknown numbers of women who are performing their abortions themselves.

Part of the inspiration, Yanow said, came from an article the Guardian US published in November. The story followed a young Texas woman who, unable to afford an abortion in the US, traveled to Mexico to purchase an abortion-inducing drug over the counter.

“There’s just so many questions,” the woman told the Guardian. “I would so much rather have a health professional help me in this and kind of guide me through it versus DIY.”

Those words stuck in Yanow’s mind. And as she grappled for a way to respond to November’s election, it occurred to her that Women Help Women could tailor its services to the needs of women in the US.

The project will be titled Self-managed Abortion, Safe and Supported, or SASS, and use the website abortionpillinfo.org.

Women Help Women is already a longstanding provider of abortion pills and instructions in other countries. Every month, its staff members answer 5,000 emails from women around the globe seeking to end their own pregnancies.

The group will not provide abortion-inducing drugs to women in the US. And it has made other changes to its methods because of the United States’ uniquely hostile, anti-abortion atmosphere.

In the US, at least 18 women have been charged with a crime based on allegations that they attempted to induce their own abortion. A handful of states have made it explicitly illegal for anyone but certain medical professionals to administer abortion-inducing drugs.

Enterprising prosecutors have found other, creative ways to levy charges, through the use of laws against child endangerment, practicing medicine without a license, or drug possession.

Women Help Women counselors will inform clients of some of the legal risks that come with self-administering misoprostol, as well as some of the limitations.

But the legal implications of the project are far from certain.

“This area of the law is nothing if not complicated,” said Jill Adams, the chief strategist of the the Self-Induced Abortion Legal Team, a project associated with Berkeley Law. Her group has shared legal information about self-induced abortion with Women Help Women, but stopped short of legally vetting the information that counselors will provide to US women.

In general, the act of looking for or giving out information about self-inducing an abortion is protected by law, Adams said. And she knows of no one who has been prosecuted merely for seeking information.

Still, it could compound the risk of prosecution. Purvi Patel, the first US woman to receive a significant prison sentence for inducing her own abortion, was convicted after prosecutors obtained emails that showed her purchasing an abortion-inducing drug from a Chinese pharmacy.

With those facts in mind, Women Help Women designed its portal to delete conversations between clients and counselors after seven days.Its servers are located abroad – out of easy reach for US prosecutors, the thinking goes – as are all 23 of its counselors.

The legal risks are thought to loom larger than the medical risks.

“In general, I would say there’s kind of a growing recognition that from a safety or a medical perspective, we have few few concerns about” women using abortion drugs on their own, said Daniel Grossman, a clinical professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of California–San Francisco who researches self-induced abortion.

“Especially if we’re talking about women using misoprostol on their own. It’s a very safe and effective medication,” he continued. “If women have information about how to use it, then women can safely use it on their own.”

When women go to an abortion clinic, they are typically given two drugs: mifepristone, a drug that blocks hormones necessary to sustain a pregnancy administered in person, and misoprostol, which is taken many hours later and causes the uterus to contract and expel its contents. The Food and Drug administration permits women to leave the clinic and take misoprostol at home.

Researchers believe that women who self-administer abortion drugs are most likely taking misoprostol by itself, because it is easy to obtain from foreign pharmacies. Misoprostol used without mifepristone is less likely to cause an abortion but still has a high success rate.

There are certain medical risks in self-administering an abortion drug without the involvement of medical professionals. An ultrasound is often necessary to confirm a pregnancy and assess how many weeks a woman has been pregnant. Misoprostol is less effective and requires a different drug regimen later in the first trimester.

Medical professionals will also inform women about how to recognize complications, like excessive bleeding, that could occur after they leave the clinic and require medical attention. And using the drug improperly – say, at a high dose in the second trimester – can lead to serious medical complications.

Grossman argued that a project like Women Help Women’s could minimize those risks. “I think that it’s worse to just remain silent while we know women are doing this,” he said.

But abortion rights opponents cite these safety concerns as reasons to oppose any project that makes abortion drugs available outside a clinical setting.

In response to a study, first reported by the Guardian, that tests the efficacy of sending women abortion drugs by mail, a spokeswoman for Americans United for Life said, “We have grave concerns about handing out dangerous, life-ending drugs without medical supervision because women face great risks for chemical abortions.”

Carol Tobias, president of the National Right to Life Committee, asked, “Who are they supposed to call if they have a problem?”

Yanow says that’s exactly the point of Women Help Women’s new portal.

“People are not being advised to use the pills,” she said. “They’re being advised if they’ve already decided to use the pills. What drives this project is the knowledge that women have been managing this on their own.”

New website offers US women help to perform their own abortions

Republicans push ahead with plans to hinder insurance coverage for abortions

Republicans in Congress are advancing a bill that imposes a far-reaching ban on private insurance coverage for abortion services for as long as the Affordable Care Act remains in effect and would make permanent a longtime ban on the use of Medicaid to cover abortions.

The bill, H R7, would allow Donald Trump to fulfill a promise that helped his volatile presidential campaign secure the support of major anti-abortion rights activists. In an open letter published in September, he vowed to sign the Hyde amendment, a perennial budget rider that Congress has approved every year for 40 years, into permanent law. Since 1976, the Hyde amendment has prevented millions of women who rely on Medicaid, the government-funded insurance for low-income individuals, from using it to cover their abortions.

But if the bill passes, the most immediate changes will be felt on the insurance exchanges where millions of women purchase healthcare coverage.

HR7 prohibits insurance carriers from offering policies that contain abortion coverage on the exchanges set up under Obamacare to sell insurance coverage to individuals. It prohibits low-income women who qualify for a healthcare subsidy from receiving it if they purchase a healthcare plan that covers abortion. And it would withhold the small business tax credit from employers who offer policies with abortion coverage.

Critics of HR7 fear it could impose a widespread ban on private insurance coverage of abortion by banning abortion coverage in the small subset of private insurance policies that are sold on the Affordable Care Act exchanges.

Because many insurance carriers offer policies to individuals on the exchanges that are similar to the group policies they sell to companies, covering abortion in one case but not the other requires an extra layer of administration.

Health experts said they could not be certain that would be the outcome.

“What that would do to other plans, we don’t really know,” said Laurie Sobel, the associate director for women’s health policy for the Kaiser Family Foundation, a healthcare thinktank. But she noted that after Obamacare began requiring contraceptive coverage in individual policies sold on the exchanges, group policies that did not face the same requirements began to offer identical coverage.

“With very limited exceptions, health insurance companies essentially did the same thing with everybody,” Sobel said. “That is worrisome in terms of, if abortion coverage was restricted in the marketplace, insurance companies might just adopt that policy across the board.”

The ban on using subsidies or tax credits toward policies with abortion coverage could also effect significant changes, because carriers could be reluctant to design plans that so many women or small business owners would be ineligible to purchase. In 2016, there were 871,000 uninsured women eligible to purchase policies containing abortion coverage using subsidies, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Under the bill, tens of thousands more who have already used their subsidies to purchase insurance would lose abortion coverage.

The bill’s restrictions on the health insurance exchanges would cease to apply if and when legislation passed by Republicans in Congress repeals the Affordable Care Act. But the bill is almost certainly a preview of the lengths to which Republicans will go to restrict abortion when they come to replace Obamacare.

“It’s a pretty sweeping bill,” said Destiny Lopez, a director of All Above All, a coalition of abortion rights groups that opposes the Hyde amendment. “It’s an attempt to withhold abortion from nearly all women in the US through burdensome regulation intended to stop insurers from covering abortions. It could restrict abortion for nearly every woman in this country in some way, and do significant harm in particular to low-income women.”

Insurance coverage for abortion is already limited in a way that forces thousands of women to pay for abortions out of pocket. Twenty-five states restrict the sale of insurance policies covering abortion on their state exchanges. And exchanges in six other states don’t offer any plans that cover abortions, possibly because Congress imposed extra administrative hurdles under the ACA for providing abortion coverage.

A 2013 study found that only about a quarter of abortion patients who had insurance used it to cover their procedure. Those who didn’t use their insurance overwhelmingly said their insurance did not cover abortion or they weren’t sure.

The bill would also convert a slew of existing, provisional bans on abortion coverage into permanent law. These include bans on abortion coverage for women on federal insurance, such as many Native American women, women in the Peace Corps, in federal prisons, or those enrolled in Medicare or the Children’s Health Insurance Program, and prohibit the city of Washington DC fromusing its own local funds to subsidize abortion services.

The House of Representatives approved a version of the bill on Tuesday, and the Senate will consider similar legislation next week. But Republicans in that chamber will need to peel off eight Democratic or independent votes for the 60 needed to overcome a filibuster. Unless Republican leaders change the Senate’s rules to eliminate the filibuster, the fate of the bill may lie with Democrats facing re-election in 2018 in states that voted for Trump.

“We’re confident that the Senate will continue to be a firewall on this issue,” said Lopez.

Also on Tuesday, Republicans introduced a federal “heartbeat” bill that they say would effectively “eliminate” abortion, but is less likely to pass even the House.

Despite Hyde’s longevity, progressive lawmakers in recent years have adopted efforts to see it overturned. Even Hillary Clinton, in her 2016 bid for the presidency, promised to attempt to remove Hyde from future budget bills. HR7, although it does not change the fact that women on Medicaid have long been forced to pay for any abortion services out of pocket, would make it harder for a future Democratic Congress or president to do so.

HR7 is titled the No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion and Abortion Insurance Full Disclosure Act of 2017. Republican congressman Chris Smith of New Jersey introduced the bill in early January, as he has for several years running.

At an event to announce the bill, Smith said he supports repealing and replacing the Affordable Care Act, but that it is necessary to restrict the ways in which the law facilitates abortion coverage until that time.

“No one knows how quickly the replace part will actually occur,” Smith said. “In the meantime, the unborn child is about to be killed with public funding. We need to enact a statute that takes abortion out of [Obamacare].”

Republicans push ahead with plans to hinder insurance coverage for abortions

Sturgeon confirms Scottish talks on free abortions for Northern Irish women

Nicola Sturgeon has confirmed that the Scottish government is to explore how to allow Northern Irish women to obtain free access to abortions in Scotland’s NHS hospitals.

Scotland’s first minister, during a visit to Dublin on Tuesday, said that the Edinburgh devolved government would hold talks with the Scottish NHS that may enable women from Northern Ireland to have terminations for free on the health service.

Across the UK, the NHS has so far refused to pay for abortions for women from Northern Ireland who travel to Britain. The procedure is only available in Northern Ireland’s hospitals when the pregnancy poses a direct threat to the mother’s life. It is illegal in all other cases.

Last week. Patrick Harvie MSP, the leader of the Green party in the Scottish parliament, said it can cost between £400 and £2,000 for a woman from Northern Ireland to obtain an abortion at a private clinic in Britain.

The supreme court in London is considering an application from a Northern Irish teenager, who, as a 15-year-old, had to go to England to terminate a pregnancy. She is challenging the NHS’s refusal to fund abortions for women from Northern Ireland.

Sturgeon said: “I was asked a question specifically in parliament about the scenario where a woman from Northern Ireland chooses to access an abortion in Scotland and whether they should be charged for that or not.

“Now I said that we would explore that, so we are looking in terms of the process and will discuss with the NHS what would happen now routinely, and whether there are options to change that, to make the process safer for the women concerned.

“My view is that if a woman is going to access an abortion then the important thing is that it is as safe as possible … I am not putting a timescale on it but I will report back to parliament in due course.”

An estimated 2,000 women a year have to raise the money to travel to private English clinics and hospitals from Northern Ireland to have terminations.

However, there is strong opposition from both unionist and nationalist members of the Northern Ireland assembly to liberalising the province’s strict anti-abortion laws. The Abortion Act 1967 was never extended to Northern Ireland and an attempt to ease the law to include cases of fatal foetal abnormalities and pregnancy via sexual crime was rejected this year.

Sturgeon was speaking at an event organised by IBEC, the Irish employers’ organisation, on the second day of her official visit to Ireland. Later on Tuesday she will become the first leader of Scotland to address the Irish parliament when she will deliver a speech in its upper house, the Seanad.

Before her lunchtime speech, Sturgeon said she would press London to retain an open border between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland and this was central to her discussions with the British government over the impact of Brexit.

“It is absolutely essential to maintain an open border … It is important to emphasise the unique status of Ireland, the peace process and the Good Friday agreement, and keeping an open border. Out of all of the things that we no doubt find disagreements on in terms of Brexit – what does it mean and what paths the UK take – I would hope that something everybody in the UK and also in the European Union can agree on is that there has to be solutions found to avoid some of the implications of Brexit for the island of Ireland,” she said.

She also addressed what she called the “ill will” that exists between London and Brussels since the EU referendum.

Sturgeon said: “I don’t think ill will on this is inevitable but I think it will occur if the UK continues to display the kind of attitude towards this whole situation that it has been doing. But I don’t think ill will is inevitable and that is related to the issue of a plan. If the UK gets itself into a position that is clear, reasonable about what it’s trying to achieve then there may be scope to have a relatively harmonious process that delivers a compromise position.

“There is no plan at present and anyone who tries to suggest otherwise is just indulging in hope over reality. I think Whitehall has been discovering day by day just how complicated the whole situation is. Do I have confidence that there will be a coherent plan? As I say, the jury is out on that and it is still not highly clear to me how the UK gets from where it is now to having a clear consistent plan by the end of March.”

Sturgeon confirms Scottish talks on free abortions for Northern Irish women

Scotland’s offer to give abortions to Northern Irish women shames Stormont | Patrick Corrigan

Scotland and Northern Ireland are separated by just a few short miles of sea. But when it comes to access to abortion, they are divided by more than 150 years of history. While Scots women are able to access abortions on the same basis as their counterparts in England and Wales, Northern Irish women still face a near-total ban on the termination of pregnancy.

In 2014-15, only 16 women were able to have lawful abortions in Northern Ireland. By contrast, 833 Ulster women travelled to England or Wales and paid for terminations at private clinics. And despite being full and equal taxpayers, Northern Ireland-resident women have been barred from accessing free abortions in NHS hospitals in England, Wales and Scotland.

It was into this breach that Scotland’s first minister, Nicola Sturgeon, stepped last week when she told the Scottish parliament that she would explore the possibility of women and girls from Northern Ireland being able to access terminations through NHS Scotland. Her intervention has enraged the deeply conservative Democratic Unionist party (DUP), Northern Ireland’s largest party of government, but been welcomed by pro-choice and human rights campaigners in the region.

While healthcare has been a devolved matter in Scotland since the creation of the Scottish parliament, it was only in May this year that abortion law was handed over to Holyrood. It is against this backdrop that Sturgeon’s intervention has demonstrated leadership on behalf of Northern Irish women sorely lacking both at Stormont and Westminster. There is near unanimous support in the Holyrood parliament for keeping abortion provision for Scotland in line with the 1967 Abortion Act. The picture couldn’t be more different across the water.

As recently as February this year, the Northern Ireland assembly voted to keep the region’s abortion law as it is, refusing to legislate for abortion even in cases of rape, incest, or where the foetus has no chance of survival outside the womb. This was despite a Belfast high court finding, just two months previously, that Northern Ireland law breaches the European convention on human rights.

Meanwhile, the UK health secretary Jeremy Hunt has determined that the NHS in England must operate a residence-based system so that women who live in Northern Ireland are barred from accessing NHS abortion services in England, despite being UK citizens. This position is currently the subject of a legal challenge at the UK supreme court taken by a Northern Ireland teenager and her mother. They want women and girls from Northern Ireland to receive free abortions on the NHS in England.

The young woman at the centre of the case was 15 in 2012 when she and her mother travelled from Northern Ireland to Manchester and were asked to pay for a private termination. It is estimated that, with private clinic charges as well as the cost of travel and accommodation, a Northern Ireland woman needs to find anything between £400 and £2,000 to obtain a lawful abortion across the water in Britain – NHS care available for free to women in every other part of the UK.

Northern Ireland’s politicians are being left behind by the people

Stephen Cragg, who is acting as QC for the mother and daughter, told the supreme court at a hearing earlier this month that women and girls like his client are “second-class citizens” who “live in the UK, but – unlike all other women and girls in the UK – they are at risk of the most serious criminal penalty if they procure an abortion in their own area”.

In Northern Ireland, any woman or girl who has an abortion deemed unlawful is liable for prosecution and could face a sentence of up to life imprisonment. Earlier this year a woman who had induced her own miscarriage by taking abortion pills obtained over the internet was found guilty under the 1861 Offences Against the Person Act and given a three-month suspended sentence. There are a number of other similar cases poised to come before the courts in Northern Ireland, including the prosecution of a mother who obtained the pills on behalf of her pregnant teenage daughter.

Despite all this, a majority of Northern Ireland’s politicians have set their face against reform. Comfortable in their self-designation as “pro-life”, they appear to be immune to criticism – even from the UN, whose human rights committee recently ruled that this part of the UK’s laws prohibiting and criminalising abortion constitute a human rights violation.

But, increasingly, Northern Ireland’s politicians are being left behind by the people. Independent polling published recently by Amnesty International showed that seven in 10 people want to see Northern Ireland’s harsh abortion laws changed, while more than half want to see abortion decriminalised altogether. The tens of thousands of people who are calling for abortion to be decriminalised also speak to that shift.

Sturgeon’s offer of possible help to Northern Irish women and girls should be a matter of deep embarrassment to ministers in Northern Ireland. Theresa May should match Sturgeon’s offer to stand up for Northern Irish women abandoned by their own politicians. When it comes to the human right to healthcare, lines on a map should be no barrier.

Scotland’s offer to give abortions to Northern Irish women shames Stormont | Patrick Corrigan

Nicola Sturgeon offers help to Northern Irish women seeking abortions

Nicola Sturgeon has told the Scottish parliament that the devolved government would explore the possibility of women from Northern Ireland obtaining terminations in Scotland’s health service for free.

Responding to a question from Green party MSP Patrick Harvie on Thursday, the first minister said: “I am happy to explore with the NHS what the situation is now in terms of the ability of women from Northern Ireland to access safe and legal abortion in NHS Scotland and whether any improvements can be made.

“Like Patrick Harvie, I believe that women should have the right to choose, within the limits that are currently set down in law, and that that right should be defended. When a woman opts to have an abortion – I stress that that is never, ever an easy decision for any woman – the procedure should be available in a safe and legal way.”

The health service has so far refused to pay for abortions for women from Northern Ireland who travel to Britain for terminations. The procedure 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, it is illegal.

Harvie pointed out that women from Northern Ireland had to fund their own private terminations which can cost from £400 to £2,000.

He asked Sturgeon if she would “agree that the national health service in Scotland should be exploring what can be done to ensure that those women are able to access abortion in Scotland, if that is where they choose to travel to, without facing that kind of unacceptable financial barrier?”

The supreme court in London is currently considering an application from a Northern Irish teenager who, as a15-year-old, had to go to England to terminate a pregnancy. She is challenging the NHS’s refusal to fund abortions for women from Northern Ireland.

Amnesty International welcomed Sturgeon’s offer. Patrick Corrigan, its Northern Ireland programme director, said: “Given the utter human rights failure of Northern Ireland’s ministers to provide free, safe and legal abortion healthcare for women and girls here, we welcome the commitment of Scotland’s first minister to explore what can be done via NHS Scotland.

“The UN human rights committee recently ruled that Northern Ireland’s laws prohibiting and criminalising abortion constitute a human rights violation. The Scottish government could help lessen the harsh financial impact of that violation by allowing women from Northern Ireland to access abortions free of charge on the NHS.”

Corrigan said Sturgeon’s offer of help should not, however, allow Northern Irish politicians to do nothing on the question of abortion. “While this would be a welcome and helpful step, it is no substitute for the Northern Ireland executive putting its own house in order with respect to significant reform of our scandalous abortion laws,” he said.

“The fact that Scotland’s first minister is now exploring what she can do to help women and girls from Northern Ireland is an indictment of the failure of Northern Ireland own’s first minister, executive colleagues and the assembly.”

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

An estimated 2,000 women a year have to raise the money to travel to private English clinics and hospitals from Northern Ireland to have terminations.

However, 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 an attempt to ease the law to include cases of fatal foetal abnormalities and pregnancy via sexual crime was rejected earlier this year.

Nicola Sturgeon offers help to Northern Irish women seeking abortions

Pregnant asylum seekers on Nauru transferred to Australia for abortions

Three pregnant asylum seekers have been transferred to Australia from offshore detention on Nauru soon after requesting abortions due to the harsh situations within the detention centre and because they did not want to deliver a little one up on Nauru, Guardian Australia understands.

Of the 3 girls – the first of whom was transferred in February – one had her pregnancy terminated although the other two have however to make a ultimate decision on the termination.

The February situation – of a Rohingyan girl named Salima – was reported by the ABC. Salima’s spouse Mamun advised the ABC from Brisbane: “If we born with a youngster in Nauru the youngster need to die since the services [are] not very good in there.

“There is a very little room. Households are given a fan. But in a single camp there is no fan. When you take meals – lunch and dinner – you need to be standing two hours in the line.”

The two most current instances involve pregnant ladies transferred to Darwin. A single family members were sent around three weeks in the past and an additional all around eight weeks in the past.

Youngster asylum seeker advocate group Chilout and a senior supply with expertise of the situations confirmed the transfers had occurred.

Chilout spokeswoman Sophie Peer explained all three females had cited conditions in detention and the longevity of remain on the tiny Pacific island state as reasons for their selections.

A leaked report, written by five independent health care specialists, documented the dire state of psychological overall health between pregnant ladies on Nauru. The report mentioned that most pregnant women on the island were struggling depression, with a lot of scoring 24 on the Edinburgh postnatal depression scale, in which depression is diagnosed with a score of ten.

Guardian Australia has also been advised by a senior supply that a 32-12 months-old woman was evacuated below emergency following a suicide try on Nauru last weekend.

“The actions taken by these families indicate just how dire the scenario is on Nauru,” stated Peer.

“From maternal overall health through to paediatric care and simple living situations, the entire facility on Nauru is inappropriate for women and kids.

“Our government has stripped these households of all hope and has created family members organizing decisions practically impossible.”

Immigration minister Scott Morrison did not respond to a request for comment.

Pregnant asylum seekers on Nauru transferred to Australia for abortions

No wonder so several females are having abortions in their 20s | Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett

‘It’s controversial, but I would like to see the morning-after pill offered to bulk get from pharmacies.’ Photograph: Linda Nylind for the Guardian

New Department of Well being statistics have located that mothers are more likely to have abortions than teens pregnant for the very first time, with 53% of the girls who had abortions final yr previously obtaining a child.

The figures demonstrate that 185,331 abortions had been carried out last yr in England and Wales, a rise in line with population enhance. But all round, the price has dropped given that 2003 to 15.9 abortions in one,000.

The most significant drop in abortion rates (a third) was amongst below-18s, even though in my personal age group (25-29) so-named career-girl abortions – not a phrase I will be making use of until “profession man” becomes widespread parlance – have risen twenty% in the past ten many years.

Considering the economic downturn, the rise in abortions amongst my generation makes sense. I barely know anybody who is in a monetary position to help a baby, what with lease increases and spend freezes and widespread unemployment. In a climate in which so a lot of are frightened for their jobs, I’d envision younger ladies are unsure as to what taking maternity leave may mean for their careers in the prolonged run. That’s if they get maternity leave, of program – we freelancers are in an even far more precarious position.

Financial constraints are affecting older women, as well. Households are struggling to make ends meet, and might be unable to afford an additional kid. We also know that the quantity of more than-40s obtaining unprotected sex is rising – partly simply because of divorce and new relationships (even Guardian Soulmates might play a element) but also because, in terms of contraception, they are a much neglected group. Girls will assume they are no longer fertile, or baby boomers may not have utilized contraception the first time round (“It was pre-Aids, darling,” my mom when stated to me). Consequently the Family members Organizing Association campaign of a few years back showcasing ugly 1970s outfits with the tagline: “Don’t forget wearing this? Then keep in mind to dress in this,” with a image of a condom.

That the charge among youngsters has dropped can be seen only as excellent information, reflecting the emphasis that has been positioned on teenage pregnancy more than the past ten years, with schools and sexual wellness charities bombarding teens with contraception. Which is a massive change from my own time at school, when data was difficult to get hold of and the problem rarely talked about.

I always felt that the media hysteria in excess of 13-year-olds being presented the pill was misplaced. Put them all on it, for all I care, because we know it performs, just as we know that decent sex schooling won’t turn 8E into a class of shaggers overnight.

However, I wonder how a lot the rise in abortions taking place in women’s mid-to-late 20s is as relevant to bad accessibility to contraception as it is monetary constraints.

Several close friends have been turned away from Brook clinics right after reaching the cutoff age of 25, and very rightly so. But the gap in services is not being adequately bridged, particularly when you happen to be trying to get an appointment out of doing work hrs. You can get the contraceptive pill with no seeing a doctor by way of Lloyds Pharmacy by filling in a quick questionnaire on the internet and then going to choose it up on the very same day, but a lot of folks are unaware of this. Accessibility to the morning-after pill remains patchy – to receive it for free, you may have to attend a clinic that is miles away. And pharmacists have the appropriate to refuse you services – especially problematic if it’s Sunday and you dwell in a rural spot.

In addition, the frankly scandalous price tag, of £25 (it costs about €7 – £5.60 – in France in excess of the counter) is prohibitive for many who may be unable to attain a free of charge clinic or doctor’s surgical treatment in time.

It’s controversial, but I would like to see the morning-following pill obtainable to bulk-get from pharmacies. At the second, you can purchase it for instant or potential use on the internet (most spots charge £25 but I identified one particular spot that costs £6.50 a pill – duly bookmarked). Worryingly, although, the questionnaires are often not that thorough, and most locations will let you have no more than two at a time.

There is also the 5-day-after pill, EllaOne – a drug barely anyone I know has heard of – that is offered on prescription and, in some places, over the counter.

But I would like to see women of all ages currently being greater informed about their contraceptive choices – there is even now a good deal of stigma and misinformation out there. Let’s make certain that the target on teens doesn’t detract from the require for better contraception services for older ladies.

No wonder so several females are having abortions in their 20s | Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett

"Lifestyle" abortions warning as serial termination numbers surge

MPs and campaign groups declare that restrictions below the 1967 Abortion Act are now currently being broadly ignored – making it possible for the process to be used as a “lifestyle choice” and a type of contraception rather than a final resort.

It comes amid controversy above choices by police and prosecutors not to charge doctors who pre-signed abortion varieties with no even seeing the women concerned.

But Ann Furedi, chief executive of the UK’s biggest abortion provider, the British Pregnancy Advisory Services (BPAS), mentioned terminations need to be viewed as a “standard” part of women’s healthcare.

She accused those who argue that the law is being flouted of “politicising” abortion.

Even though the complete quantity of terminations on British residents edged larger, the total abortion fee as a proportion of the population slipped to its lowest degree for 16 many years, amid speedy population growth.

For first time, unmarried females but who described themselves as getting a companion, accounted for a vast majority (51 per cent) of those getting abortions.

When mixed with married girls, it implies that more than two thirds had a spouse of partner – up from significantly less than half a decade earlier.

The figures also present a speedy rise in the number of serial abortions.

At the excessive end, there were 49 women in England and Wales who had already had at least eight prior abortions.

The figure was up almost half on that in 2012, when there were 33 in this group.

But practically 19,000 ladies were at least on their third abortion – an eight per cent rise in a single year.

There were also nearly 8,500 abortions performed on women above forty like 24 who in excess of-50s.

Meanwhile there had been 190 procedures carried out following the 24 week restrict, almost a fifth greater than in 2012.

Fiona Bruce, the Conservative MP and chair of chair of an all-celebration group on abortion on disability grounds, stated: “Rather than supplying for abortion in excellent circumstances as originally intended by the Abortion Act, these figures display a concerning and escalating trend of abortion sadly being utilised as a life style option or as a substitute for contraception.

“Better counselling and guidance is essential for females as to the choices to abortion offered in buy to lessen a number of abortions and the prospective unfavorable effects upon the girls themselves.”

Jim Dobbin, the Labour MP, added: “Why, in a nation which apparently abhors abortion being used as a technique of contraception, do the figures for repeat abortions keep rising?”

But Ms Furedi explained: “There is no right or incorrect amount of abortions, basically that any girl who needs an abortion is capable to get a single.

“One in 3 ladies will have an abortion, and these figures demonstrate plainly that females require very good access to contraception and abortion providers at every stage of their reproductive lifetimes.

“We should cease politicising abortion and accept that it is a regular component of women’s healthcare.

“Much effort has been place into enhancing contraception companies for younger women, but ladies really do not stop obtaining sex when they hit 25.

“We need to construct companies that meet the needs of older women, frequently juggling jobs and childcare, who are time bad and need a lot more straightforward access to their picked contraception technique.”

"Lifestyle" abortions warning as serial termination numbers surge

Midwives can take top role in abortions

The move cames as Royal School of Nursing and abortion suppliers have lobbied for a change in the law to enable nurses full handle of abortion induced by medicines or some other strategies.

The Division of Overall health said the new tips produced no distinction to the law and simply clarified the current rules from the 1980s. A spokesman explained nurses and midwives can “administer abortion drugs” if medical professionals remain “in charge all through”.

Nonetheless Fiona Bruce, the Conservative MP, informed the Day-to-day Mail the new suggestions have been a “clear liberalisation of abortion law which people do not want.”

“Moreover, I do not feel that it is what Parliament intended.”

Labour MP Jim Dobbin, Labour MP and the co-chairman of the all-celebration Parliamentary Professional-life Group, stated the Department of health get “every opportunity to make daily life less complicated for the abortion industry”.

He extra: “The Abortion Act is crystal clear that a certified medical doctor is the only individual in a position to complete an abortion.”

Nonetheless Ann Furedi, chief executive of the greatest abortion supplier, BPAS said nurses had been the “best people” to perform early abortions.

She explained: “They should be carried out by certified folks, including nurses.”

A Division of Wellness spokesman said: “There has been no change in the role nurses and midwives perform in abortion because the 1980s. Recent suggestions only clarified current law.

“Nurses and midwives can administer abortion medicines but medical professionals have to approve abortions and continue to be in charge all through.”

Midwives can take top role in abortions

Never judge older ladies on their correct to have abortions | Viv Groskop

‘In 2012 there have been twelve,873 abortions performed to women aged beneath 18. This is the age group we must be safeguarding and listening to.’ Photograph: Alamy

The new details on abortions and the above-35s from the Department of Overall health is confusing – unless of course you presume, as numerous information reviews have so far, that ladies are stupid. Then it truly is easily explained.

We are supposed to think about that a six% improve given that 2001 in ladies in their late 30s and 40s searching for abortions is a “sharp rise”. This is supposedly since: (a) these girls mistakenly feel they are also previous to conceive and so will not require contraception and (b) the recession has manufactured “accidents” as well difficult to proceed with. The first part can make girls look idiotic. The second is incredibly intriguing – but fully unattainable to demonstrate.

The British Pregnancy Advisory Services reports that 4 in ten women aged more than 40 who went for an abortion more than three many years were not employing contraception. This is in contrast with fewer than one in 3 20- to 24-year-olds. I can see why you would look at these statistics and believe: “Ah yes, I see. Older females presume they cannot get pregnant. But they can! Younger girls are less very likely to believe like that.”

But what’s the real agenda right here? Josephine Quintavalle, of the campaign group Comment on Reproductive Ethics, gives us a clue: “Women have misplaced touch with the nature of human reproduction. Women require far more info about their very own biology. Not every little thing can be fixed with a trip to the chemist for the abortion pill or to the IVF clinic.” Here is the message, then: shame on those ignorant girls who thought they could “resolve everything” with their satisfied-go-lucky “trip”.

In this instance I am not positive that women do need a lot more details. I think they want to be respected, assumed to have a brain and a conscience, and left to live their lives as they choose. They are not selecting out specific outfits and matching luggage for their “journey”. They truly aren’t. (To be clear: I am personally not pro-abortion. I am pro-selection.)

It truly is disturbing that we are focusing on some thing as small as a 6% rise and attributing this to women’s supposed ignorance. In 2012 there had been seven,737 abortions carried out for females aged among 40 and 44 in 2002 this figure had been six,531. What does this increase prove? Perhaps women are getting more intercourse than they did in 2002. Perhaps they are pleased to get the risk of obtaining pregnant, and then realise it truly is a error for them. Maybe abortion is less stigmatised. Perhaps there are a number of socioeconomic and cultural factors that could all quite easily combine to make clear this very modest enhance. Crazy imagined, I know.

The actuality is that girls know that their fertility falls sharply after 35. But they also know that is not the exact same as being infertile. We only have to appear close to us to see the proof. I do not know any girls in excess of the age of 35 who, simply because they weren’t making use of contraception, have had an abortion. I do know of loads of “accident” infants who have stretched their parents’ finances to the restrict throughout the recession. And I know many ladies in excess of the age of 40 who have had infants.

In idealistic terms, of course no a single desires an abortion to consider spot. But individuals have to be allowed to make problems in their lives. The interpretation of this data is one more way to demean and to judge. It is also a hazardous distraction. In 2012 there have been 12,873 abortions carried out on girls aged underneath 18. This is the age group we must be protecting and listening to. These are the women we must be talking to about contraception and understanding your personal entire body. Older girls can search right after themselves. Never belittle their difficult-won selections – or their ability to make them.

Never judge older ladies on their correct to have abortions | Viv Groskop

Abortions are not for small disabilities, says minister

The Government is preparing to problem new advice to medical doctors on the Abortion Act and how it is being interpreted by health-related experts.

In 2012, two,692 foetuses have been aborted on the grounds that there was a “substantial risk” that the babies would be “seriously handicapped”. Of individuals, 160 took spot soon after 24 weeks of gestation.

In a debate in Parliament, Mrs Ellison pointed to proof that situations such as a cleft lip and palate could be “an indicator of far much more significant problems”.

Even so, she stated: “Concerns have been expressed… that abortions are taking place for abnormalities that are rectifiable soon after birth.”

She explained that the Government would seem at the scale of the problem in the nation. Fiona Bruce, the Conservative MP for Congleton, told MPs: “When mothers and fathers hear the information about a child’s diagnosis with foetal disability, it is important that they are provided information about the spectrum and about their choices.”

In an emotional speech, Mrs Bruce spoke of her son, Sam, who was born with a club foot.

She stated: “My son had physiotherapy every single day for the initial year of his existence. He wore a calliper in his early years and he had two operations, but now no a single would by no means know.

She extra: “Yesterday, Sam was 21, and in the past few days has heard that he has been admitted to Oxford University. It is tough to consider that such a treatable disability could have deprived him of existence, and he is far from alone.”

Mrs Ellison stated that she would now raise Mrs Bruce’s worries with the Royal University of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists.

The guidance comes following ministers ordered a new survey of birth ratios in Britain amid fears that sex-selective abortions are taking area in Britain.

Abortions are not for small disabilities, says minister

Abortion scandal: "abortions improve opportunity of infertility", claims counsellor

A counsellor at a Crisis Pregnancy Centre (CPC) in London – portion of a network of clinics that give tips to women taking into consideration a termination – was recorded producing these claims last month.

At the London CPC, named the Central London Women’s Centre (CLWC), a reporter was told by an adviser that an abortion carried various “risks”, which includes the possibility of “sterility”. The counsellor also advised the reporter that infection was “quite common”.

“As with any operation you know you are introducing something from outdoors the physique into the within of the body and there’s usually a chance but with abortion there’s also a certain threat of, clearly the instruments that are utilized are sharp and they cut the wall of the womb.

“I suggest 1 of the scientific studies the examine that we tend to use is, it says that you are 25 % less probably to be ready to carry a future pregnancy to term”, stated the counsellor, who gave her title as Annabel.

The Royal School of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists explained the chance of becoming left infertile was “quite, very low”. Kate Guthrie, a spokesman for the University and a advisor gynaecologist for Hull and East Riding, said that simply because females were “always” screened before an abortion and “every ladies also will get a schedule course of antibiotics right after the abortion” the risk of infection was also reduced.

The Telegraph launched its investigation into CPCs following obtaining info that particular centres had been offering females inaccurate medical details to females taking into consideration a termination.

Abortion scandal: "abortions improve opportunity of infertility", claims counsellor

Abortion scandal: "abortions improve breast cancer risk", claims counsellor

Women are becoming wrongly advised that an abortion could improve their danger of establishing breast cancer in the course of counselling sessions at independent advisory clincs, The Telegraph can disclose.

Final month, Telegraph reporters approached a centre in Luton, named the Alma Pregnancy Advisory Services (APAS), claiming to be considering an abortion.

The counsellor, named Moira, told the reporter, “there’s also a hyperlink with breast cancer”.

An undercover reporter also visited a CPC in London the place she was told that there was “an elevated statistical probability of little one abuse” since ladies had to break “natural barriers that surround the kid that you really don’t cross” in buy to terminate a pregnancy.

The identical adviser also stated that women who had terminations were 25 % significantly less probably to be capable to carry a pregnancy to full term.

The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists explained there was “absolutely no evidence” that women have been a lot more most likely to build breast cancer or abuse youngsters right after obtaining an abortion. It also described the suggestion that they had been much less probably to be capable to carry a pregnancy to full term as “absolutely wrong”.

Abortion scandal: "abortions improve breast cancer risk", claims counsellor

New Government guidelines will enable "rubber stamping" of abortions

Almost 190,000 unwanted babies a yr are aborted in England and Wales underneath the 1967 Act which says that terminations can get area legally if two medical professionals agree in good faith that the physical or mental well being of the girl or youngster is at risk.

Ministers have admitted that less than half of girls who have abortions now see both of the medical professionals face-to-encounter just before being offered the go-ahead and new proposals contained in a Government consultation propose that it is not even a legal necessity for medical professionals to give individual requests any energetic believed prior to approving them.

“What this does, by successfully bypassing the medical professionals and leaving them as a rubber stamp overseeing the method, is erodes those protections [of the Act],” said Dr Peter Saunders, Chief Executive of the Christian Healthcare Fellowship.

“The selection about no matter whether an abortion should be carried out calls for fairly a whole lot of specialist health care understanding due to the fact you acquired to affirm on a statutory document that the danger of continuing with the pregnancy than that of possessing an abortion to the mother’s mental or physical overall health.

“I never believe that is a decision that a nurse can effortlessly make in a hectic abortion clinic that removes protection even more from the woman and most importantly the unborn child that the Act was initially meant to shield.”

New Government guidelines will enable "rubber stamping" of abortions