Two recent cases have brought Northern Ireland’s extremely restrictive abortion legislation under scrutiny. Earlier this month, Sarah Ewart appeared on the BBC Nolan Show to recount how she was forbidden an abortion in Northern Ireland after her baby was diagnosed with anencephaly – a fatal condition in which the skull and parts of the brain do not develop. She had had to travel to England at her own cost to obtain the procedure. After Ewart’s story emerged, another woman, only identified as “Laura”, appealed to the NI Health Minister Edwin Poots to be allowed an abortion. She is pregnant with twins, both of whom suffer from the same condition as Ewart’s baby. Northern Ireland allows abortion only in cases in which there is a direct threat to the mother’s life, or she is likely to suffer long-term mental problems because of the pregnancy. Foetal abnormalities are not an accepted reason for the procedure to legally take place.
These two cases have intensified the debate around Poots and the draft advice on abortion that the ministry published in March this year. The long-awaited guidelines include new rules on involving a psychiatrist in deciding whether an abortion can be permitted, and give strict instructions on how each abortion needs to be documented. But, the most contentious feature of the draft guidelines has been the warning that medical staff could face up to 10 years prison term if they failed to report their suspicions of unlawful terminations to the police. This, as a retired obstetrician told the BBC, has led to a “mood of fear” among health care staff in Northern Ireland. While the guidelines stipulate that advising women to travel to other countries to obtain an abortion is a “grey area”, it is also clear that in no way does the Department of Health condone such behaviour.
The consultation period for the draft guidelines closed this week, and Poots is to deliver the revised version to the Stormont Executive in a matter of weeks. But what change can the women of Northern Ireland expect? It is likely that some clarification on the reporting of “illegal” abortions will be given. The Director of Public Prosecutions in Northern Ireland, Barra McGrory for example said that counselling or abetting a woman to travel to England for an abortion could not be considered a criminal offence under the current law – even if the draft guidelines might imply so. Justice Minister David Ford has also previously stated that he will bring a paper to the Northern Ireland Executive looking at issues around termination in the cases of severe foetal abnormality.
However, as Ford also said, it is quite unlikely that anything similar to the abortion legislation that applies in the rest of the UK will be introduced, as such reforms would "not have public support in Northern Ireland". Still, abortion legislation has been hotly debated in NI after the death of Savita Halappanavar in the Republic of Ireland, which has similarly restrictive policies, and the opinions of the people might not be as divided as Ford suggests: a 2012 Belfast Telegraph poll found that 45% of the people were for legalising abortion in cases of foetal abnormalities or incest/rape.
Abortion is a contentious issue even in less religious countries than Northern Ireland. However, as studies have shown, not only does banning the procedure (or strictly limiting it) do little to stop abortions from taking place, it pushes women to dangerous and harmful procedures. The Guttmacher Institute reported last year that almost a half of all abortions in the world are “unsafe”, and that the rate of terminations is actually higher in countries with severe restrictions on the policies (presumably because these countries commonly also restrict women’s access to contraceptives and sex education).
Too much harm is done by authorities and campaigners refusing to acknowledge that no matter how tight “pro-life” (or anti-choice) legislation is, abortions will not cease to happen. Even if the upcoming revised guidelines are likely to change little in Northern Ireland’s policies, the cases of Sarah and Laura should once again remind the decision-makers and the public that often real-life abortion decisions are not about the never-ending debate of a woman’s ownership of her own body vs. the supposed “personhood” of a foetus. These women wanted to be mothers but when the worst came to happen, the state not only refused to help, but also condemned them and the babies it claims to protect to useless pain and misery.
