New Zealand has passed legislation to have abortions treated as a health issue rather than in crime legislation, with the change passing on Wednesday by a vote of 68 to 51.
The legislation replaces abortion laws in place since 1977 and proposes that a woman should have access to abortion until 20 weeks of pregnancy, with advice from a doctor.
After 20 weeks, a pregnant woman would require a test and two doctors would have to agree that an abortion is the right decision.
Photo: AP
Under the old law, a woman could only legally get an abortion if two doctors certified that continuing the pregnancy would result in danger to her mental or physical health.
Statistics New Zealand data show that in 2018, 13,282 induced abortion were performed in the nation of about 4.7 million people.
New Zealand Minister of Justice Andrew Little said that the previous law meant that most women who received abortions lied about their mental health.
National Party lawmaker Simeon Brown, who opposed the change, said that fetuses have a heartbeat and feel pain, and should be considered a person who is treated with dignity and respect.
Jackie Edmond, chief executive of Family Planning, New Zealand’s largest referrer of women to abortion services, said she was thrilled with the vote.
“It’s fantastic that parliament has addressed something that they should have addressed 40 years ago,” Edmond said.
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern in 2017 promised on the campaign trail that the issue would be brought to a vote.
Margaret Sparrow was 21 years old when she drank a concoction to induce an abortion, now aged 84, she said she was delighted with the law change.
“It’s been a long time coming,” said Sparrow, a doctor who is an abortion advocate.
Sparrow said it was not so much her own experience of having an abortion that motivated her work over the decades, but more recognizing that there was an unfilled need for women.
She began her career helping students get access to contraception and for several years helped send people to Australia to get abortions before the first New Zealand clinic opened.
She said that Roe v Wade the 1973 US Supreme Court decision gave people hope for change in New Zealand.
Sparrow said that the new law was a step forward, but her work is not done yet.
“It will be safer for women and better for access,” she said. “The next stage is making sure it’s implemented.”
Former Nicaraguan president Violeta Chamorro, who brought peace to Nicaragua after years of war and was the first woman elected president in the Americas, died on Saturday at the age of 95, her family said. Chamorro, who ruled the poor Central American country from 1990 to 1997, “died in peace, surrounded by the affection and love of her children,” said a statement issued by her four children. As president, Chamorro ended a civil war that had raged for much of the 1980s as US-backed rebels known as the “Contras” fought the leftist Sandinista government. That conflict made Nicaragua one of
COMPETITION: The US and Russia make up about 90 percent of the world stockpile and are adding new versions, while China’s nuclear force is steadily rising, SIPRI said Most of the world’s nuclear-armed states continued to modernize their arsenals last year, setting the stage for a new nuclear arms race, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) said yesterday. Nuclear powers including the US and Russia — which account for about 90 percent of the world’s stockpile — had spent time last year “upgrading existing weapons and adding newer versions,” researchers said. Since the end of the Cold War, old warheads have generally been dismantled quicker than new ones have been deployed, resulting in a decrease in the overall number of warheads. However, SIPRI said that the trend was likely
BOMBARDMENT: Moscow sent more than 440 drones and 32 missiles, Volodymyr Zelenskiy said, in ‘one of the most terrifying strikes’ on the capital in recent months A nighttime Russian missile and drone bombardment of Ukraine killed at least 15 people and injured 116 while they slept in their homes, local officials said yesterday, with the main barrage centering on the capital, Kyiv. Kyiv City Military Administration head Tymur Tkachenko said 14 people were killed and 99 were injured as explosions echoed across the city for hours during the night. The bombardment demolished a nine-story residential building, destroying dozens of apartments. Emergency workers were at the scene to rescue people from under the rubble. Russia flung more than 440 drones and 32 missiles at Ukraine, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy
Indonesia’s Mount Lewotobi Laki-Laki yesterday erupted again with giant ash and smoke plumes after forcing evacuations of villages and flight cancelations, including to and from the resort island of Bali. Several eruptions sent ash up to 5km into the sky on Tuesday evening to yesterday afternoon. An eruption on Tuesday afternoon sent thick, gray clouds 10km into the sky that expanded into a mushroom-shaped ash cloud visible as much as 150km kilometers away. The eruption alert was raised on Tuesday to the highest level and the danger zone where people are recommended to leave was expanded to 8km from the crater. Officers also
RSS