[Press Release]: Unfounded Abortion Bill Rejected in France

Alliance VITA takes note that the French Senate rejected the latest pro-abortion reform “to extend abortion rights.”

Since abortions have reached record high numbers in France, it is particularly ironic and unfair to use the Covid pandemic as a pretext to table even more permissive abortion legislation.

The proposed bill essentially intended to destroy the remnants of any precautionary legal guidelines: by extending deadlines from 12 to 14 weeks, as well as abolishing the conscience clause for health professionals, without providing any measures whatsoever to prevent more abortions.

Caroline Roux, Alliance VITA’s Assistant General Delegate declares:

“When already confronted with unplanned pregnancies, women shouldn’t also have to face ideological hurdles. Recent statistics from the French National Institute of Demographic Research (INED) have reported that women with the lowest standard of living are much more likely to have abortions. The general public appears to be largely unconcerned by pregnant women in distress or by couples who experience complicated pregnancies. Previous measures which took abortion-related difficulties into account have been gradually phased out by successive reforms, including: the distress criteria, the reflection period for cooling-off, making information available on pregnant women’s rights and the potential maternity benefits offered. Indeed, women are frequently left alone to make a solitary decision, which is far from trivial. Furthermore, they often experience pressure to abort from men. Alliance VITA is calling on the government to conduct an unbiased epidemiological study on the causes, conditions and consequences of abortion over the past 20 years. This is an essential prerequisite for organizing a real debate focused on implementing a genuine abortion prevention policy.”