My body, Is it my own?
SHOBHA SHUKLA - CNS
Alas! it is not for 45% of women who are not empowered to make choices over their healthcare and contraception needs and choices. Nearly half of the women in 57 developing countries are denied the right to decide whether to have sex with their partners, use contraception or seek healthcare, according to UNFPA's State of World Population Report. This lack of bodily autonomy - the right to make free and informed decisions about one's own body, without coercion or violence - has serious implications for the health and wellbeing of women and girls.
We see violations of bodily autonomy when a lack of choice and decision-making leads to unplanned pregnancy, or to unsafe abortion that is a leading, yet totally preventable, cause of maternal mortality and morbidity. As per data, around 73 million induced abortions take place globally each year (majority of which are in the 21- to 34-age group). 61% of all unplanned pregnancies, and 30% of all pregnancies (planned and unplanned), end in induced abortion. However, around 45% of these abortions are unsafe. More than half of all these unsafe abortions occurred in Asia. In Latin America and Africa, nearly 75% of all abortions were unsafe. The South East Asia region experiences an estimated 3.6 million unsafe abortions annually.
An estimated 29,000 pregnant women and girls die from unsafe abortion and 7 million are injured or disabled due to unsafe abortion worldwide every year. And this is despite abortion being a common health intervention, which is very safe when carried out using a method recommended by WHO, appropriate to the pregnancy duration and by someone with the necessary skills.
"Deaths due to unsafe abortion are entirely preventable. It is lack of access to safe, timely, affordable and respectful abortion care that leads to these preventable maternal deaths," laments Melissa Cockroft, Global lead for abortion at the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF).
Although the legal status of abortion varies considerably by region, most countries permit abortion under at least some circumstances. Globally there are 22 countries where abortion is completely illegal or prohibited. However, since 1994, nearly 60 countries across the world have liberalized their abortion laws to expand the grounds under which abortion is legal.
Under its Medical Termination Pregnancy Act, abortion has been legal in India under certain specific circumstances since 1971. However, amendment to the Act made by the Supreme Court in 2022, has extended abortion rights to single and unmarried women, and has included marital rape under the Medical Termination Pregnancy Act. As the law stands now, it allows certain categories of women -- including single unmarried women, married women who were divorced or widowed, minors, rape victims or mentally ill women -- to obtain abortions up to 24 weeks into their pregnancies.
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