Abortion controversy flares in France

Press, 29 November 1979, Page 8

Abortion controversy flares in France

NZPA-Reuter Paris' France, the first Romani Catholic country to legalise! abortion, is about to be! plunged into renewed Parlia-i imentary controversy over a! j five-year-old law allowing i women to terminate their pregnancies within 10 weeks of conception. I The Government will ask; ! the National Assembly this .week to renew the abortion j legislation unchanged after, the expiry of its trial period. ; Signs are that the Assem-; I bly will be. as bitterly di-' vided as it was in 1974 when the bill to allow abortion on demand was forced through Parliament by Simone Veil when she was Health Minister.

Mrs Veil, now President of the European Parliament, said then, “Abortion is never

|a victory. I prefer to call! this progress.” I The “Veil law,” as the legislation was dubbed, was I vigorously opposed by a ! majority of Government deputies, reflecting the deep concern of their Roman Catholic constituencies. The measure became law only (with the support of the Leftiwing Opposition. 1 Under the law, abortion must be carried out by a doctor in a hospital or ap-! i proved private clinic, and girls under 18 must obtain parental permission. The cost of the abortion(maximum $l9O. including anaesthetist’s fee) is not reimbursed by the State social-security system. There is also a three-month residential qualification aimed at Dreventing France from becoming an abortion centre

■ 1 for Its southern Roman Catholic neighbours. The Government, believing ; the Veil law has in the main i worked satisfactorily, is pro- • posing no serious changes in i its provisions. i But in Parliament, the ■ Health Minister (Mr Jacques! ’ Barrot), who took over from; ■ Mrs Veil six months ago. is I certain to run into heavy! i pressure both from anti-' i: abortion campaigners de- • manding repeal of the law. 1 i and from deputies who bei; lieve the present legislation -does not go far enough. i The Roman Catholic '.'heirarchv has just renewed- : its solemn warning that s “abortion is the suppression i of a human being, an act of ■ death, a serious error. It is I I an evil for society.” i The powerful anti-abortion i ( group, “Laissez-Les Vivre,”'

(“Let Them Live”) has seized upon a recently-revealed scandal at a Parisian clinic to illustrate what it calls the iniquities of the abortionists. A gynaecologist and an anaesthetist have just been charged with several counts of infanticide, and the clinic ; was closed down by the Health Ministry. In the furious national dei bate expected to reach a climax in Parliament tomorrow. , there is an unbridgeable gulf between the “pros” and | "antis.” | Many anti-abortion campaigners are devout Roman ■ Catholics whose resolve has been bolstered by Pope John Paul’s repeated condemnation of abortion and artificial birth control. The pro-abortion lobby, on the other hand, accuses the '• French Roman Catholic

Church and other conservative elements of delaying for years the implementation of the 1967 law permitting the sale of contraceptives in France.

“Even today we are forbidden to publish any propaganda for birth control or publicise our family-planning advice centres ... if this country had a coherent family-planning system, the abortion drama would not be so acute,” a feminist spokeswoman said.

Between the two positions stand Health Minister Barrot and Moniaue Pelletier, Minister for the Feminine Condition, who are asking Parliament to endorse the Veil law “and nothing but that law.” “We have had several difficult years (since 1974). with too much veering from the law and too few public es-

tablishments setting up the necessary units.” Mrs Pelletier said recently. But in the last few months, the Minister said, the Government had won a series of pledges of support for its “moderate” policy, in particular that of the powerful French Medical Association (L’Ordre Des Medecins), which had opposed the ori'rinal Veil law and from the 1 Association of GvnaecoloI gists and obstetricians. 1 Mrs Pelletier said legal abortions were running about 150,000 a vear. with probably another 100,000 carried out annuallv but not declared to ithe authorities.

No woman had died after an abortion performed under the Veil law, whereas before 1975 between 300 and 400, died annually at the hands back-street abortionists.