Altruistic Abortions?

By Contributor | April 18, 2011

Dr. Eunice Brookman-Amissah, Ipas’s Vice President for Africa, spoke at the UN last week at the Commission on Population and Development. Dr. Amissah addressed what she considered Africa’s most pressing reproductive needs, focusing in particular on abortion.

Dr. Amissah began her remarks on addressing reproductive health challenges by highlighting the most “urgent priorities” of Africa’s women. Most neglected of these priorities, she claimed, was abortion care. “Abortion care is the most marginalized and isolated of all services needs, with the effect that women cannot obtain counseling or safe procedures,” she said.

Dr. Amissah further explained to the audience that abortions are often undertaken by mothers in Africa “not only for their own wellbeing, but also for their families, children, especially young children- for altruistic reasons.”

It is difficult to conceive of an altruistic abortion, but perhaps Dr. Amissah is referring to situations in which the mother’s life is endangered by the pregnancy, and she chooses to abort the child rather than risk loosing her life in childbirth (and thus depriving her other children of a mother).

For many at the UN who do not think the unborn child has a right to life, this might sound like a decent justification. However, even from this perspective, it must be admitted that abortion is at best a bandage over the real issue of maternal mortality. The solution to the problem of maternal mortality is not to provide a woman with access to an abortion, but rather to provide her with necessary healthcare services, especially emergency obstetric care, so that her life will not be lost during pregnancy and childbirth. Focus, funding, and political efforts need go towards providing real maternal healthcare, not towards promoting access to abortion services.

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