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Abortion: What Is Happening?************ Marge Berer Editor, Reproductive Health Matters Chair, International Consortium for Medical Abortion Chair, Voice for Choice Why I am here today Thank you very much for inviting me. I have been campaigning for women’s right to safe, legal abortion in the UK and internationally for 30 years. The Soviet Union was the first country in world to legalise abortion (Kollantai) – this was very influential in Europe and it made a big impression on me as a young woman too. I hope keeping abortion safe and legal is very important for all of you too. Law and policy Safe, legal abortion: progress Abortion is on the agenda across the world. 16 countries have liberalised their abortion laws since 1997. 10 others have increased access by speeding up the approval of facilities (India); expanding the cadres of providers (South Africa); expanding the range of methods (Ethiopia) or re-interpreting law to make more abortions legal (Thailand). (Boland Katzive 2008) 6 in 10 women now live in countries where abortion is legal. Abortion: very safe if… Where it is legal, accessible and provided safely, abortion is one of the safest clinical procedures and also one of the most common. Abortion deaths are less than 1 per 100,000 live births in North America, western Europe and NZ/Australia. Uruguay 2004 Abortion legally restricted. Complications of abortion = 29% of maternal deaths, 48% in main maternity hospital in the capital, Montevideo. Maternity hospital began to offer women with unwanted pregnancy information about how to use misoprostol at home to induce early abortion. They asked women to return for post-abortion care (+ aspiration in the case of incomplete abortion), and an effective contraceptive method. After 6 months, no more deaths or complications. (Briozzo et al, 2006) Nicaragua, El Salvador Nicaragua and El Salvador have eliminated all legal grounds for abortion. Maternal deaths are increasing – change of law