ISSUES
: Abortion
Chapter 2: Abortion debate
34
Six outrageous facts about abortion in
Ireland
By Shiromi Pinto
T
he fight for safe and legal
access to abortion in Ireland is
on. Here are six facts that bring
home the true impact of Ireland’s
draconian abortion law.
1. In Ireland, abortion is only
allowed if you are in danger
of dying
Abortion is banned except where
there is a risk to your life – but not
health. The definition of “risk” is
narrow and vague. So it’s almost
impossible to actually have an
abortion in Ireland.
2. Breaking Ireland’s abortion
law could get you 14 years in
jail or a
€
4,000 fine.
If you have an illegal abortion in
Ireland, you risk 14 years in prison. If
you’re a healthcare provider and refer
a woman to seek an abortion abroad,
it’s a fine of up to
€
4,000.Ireland’s
abortion law criminalises women,
girls and the healthcare professionals
who try to help them.
3. A woman must carry to
full term a foetus that won't
live
If a woman is carrying a foetus that
is unlikely to survive, she must still
carry that pregnancy to term under
Irish law. The trauma of doing
this is summed up by Amnesty
International’s Grainne Teggart:
“How cruel would it be to make
me go through this… To put me
through a full pregnancy. I would
have the breast milk, I would have
everybody asking me how long are
you gone?... How could they think
that would not affect someone
mentally?”
4. Equal right to life. Not
equal in practice
The 8th Amendment to Ireland’s
Constitution, made in 1983, protects
the right to life of the foetus and places
it on an equal footing with the right to
life of the woman. Most of the women
and health professionals Amnesty
spoke to, said that a woman’s rights
inevitably come second. Lupe, a
woman who was forced to carry a
dead foetus for two months, told us:
“When a woman gets pregnant in
Ireland, she loses her human rights.”
5. Ireland is happy for you to
have an abortion – as long as
it’s not in Ireland
Under Irish law, it’s legal to
travel abroad to get an abortion,
prompting the criticism that Ireland
is happy to export its human rights
responsibilities.
Emma
Kitson,
who went to the UK for an abortion
becauseher foetushada fatalmedical
condition, said: “We deserved to have
support within the Irish healthcare
system, to get us through that... They
export the problem and they forget
all about you.”
6. Each year, about 4,000
women and girls leave Ireland
to have an abortion in the UK
Many feel like criminals for doing this.
As Cerys, who travelled to the UK for
an abortion, put it: “I am a law-abiding
citizen and I felt like I was committing
a crime, like I was smuggling drugs
across the border. That feeling was
horrible.”
A woman seeking an abortion is a
woman trying to get the healthcare
she needs. She is #notacriminal. Tell
Ireland to change its abortion law.
Sign our petition today.
My Body My Rights is Amnesty’s
global campaign for sexual and
reproductive rights.
9 June 2015
Ö
The above information is
reprinted with kind permission
from Amnesty International.
Please visit
for further information.
© Amnesty International 2016
