abortion

After my initial reaction to the news of Dr. Tiller's murder, which was, unsurprisingly, everything you can wrap up in the phrase oh no fuck, came a rather self-satisfied thought that we were lucky, up here in Canada.

Third thought: is that true? What's access to late-term abortion like here?

We may have no laws here against abortion, but there is still harassment of providers and the women who need those providers.

Just as important, access is quite limited, even for a regular abortion. What's the use of being able to legally have one if in reality you can't? In Quebec and New Brunswick, you have to pay for what should be covered. In PEI, you can't get one at all: as of 2005, there was no provider in the province, and anecdotally, I believe that's still the case. Only about 16% of hospitals provide abortion, and most of those are in urban centres close to the US border.*

And then, not all of those centres provide late-term abortion (i.e. after 20 weeks).

From what I've been able to dig up (which is a few years out of date now, so absorb carefully), seems either a few provinces send women needing these kinds of abortions to the States, or they all do. Specifically, to Washington, Colorado, and Kansas.

To Dr. Tiller.

Turns out Kansas was much closer than I thought.

++

If you're interested in the most recent, yet still shockingly out of date, statistics on induced abortion in Canada, Stats Can has a publication for you. It looks like Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada bought a specific Cansim table, as well, looking at number of abortions by gestational age. If I somehow missed a more recent report, please share and I'll update this.

*Canadians For Choice. Problems in Access.

I listen to As It Happens pretty much every night it's on. It's my favourite CBC radio show.

Well, listen might be a strong word. If I'm home, the radio is definitely on by 6:30. I listen carefully to what's coming up on the show, and then the hosts' dulcet tones drift out of listening range, until something catches my ear and I focus back in.

This past Thursday, among many other interesting items, one of the hosts talked to Katha Pollitt about Sarah Palin.

It was an entertaining interview, as is generally the case on AIH. I mean, Palin is a pretty easy target, but Pollitt took sharp and swift aim.

Until, that is, they got to the section on abortion.

Almost every discussion I've heard or read regarding Palin's views on abortion is framed as "She's against abortion, even in cases of rape or incest."

Emphasis not mine.

It's an old argument lobbed at anti-choicers. I understand its place in terms of debate. It hits people at a gut level. They imagine themselves, or the loved women in their lives, already traumatized, carrying a physical and growing reminder of that trauma for 36 weeks.

Still, I think it misses the point. I don't have the stats to back this up, and because I'm a blogger, I'm not going to bother looking it up, but I'd wager a guess that most women who get abortions are not terminating a pregnancy that is the after-effect of assault. They're terminating a pregnancy that is the result of faulty contraception or miscalculation.

The assault argument, to me, feels a little like giving in. It's saying that only certain women have the right to consider all options; only women who have already paid a high price for the privilege.

I wish people would stop talking about Palin's views on SRH in this way. In a political context, I don't think it furthers the cause.

Palin's views on abortion are not wrong and ill-informed because she doesn't think assault victims should be allowed to get abortions. Her views on abortion are wrong because she does not believe that women have the right to autonomy over their own bodies, to make the best decision possible for themselves. A decision that sometimes means terminating a pregnancy, no matter how it started.