Hanging in the Balance

Below the Belt: A Column by NOW President Kim Gandy

March 20, 2009

Some stories are so horrific they leave you speechless. A nine-year-old girl from Brazil is abused and raped for three years by her stepfather, resulting in a pregnancy -- with twins. The mother arranges an abortion, which is permitted under Brazilian law in the case of rape or life endangerment. The 80-pound child qualified on both counts.

Heart-wrenching, but sadly that's not where it stopped. Brazilian Catholic Archbishop Jose Cardoso Sobrinho, supported by Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, head of the Vatican Congregation for Bishops, pronounced excommunication for the doctors involved in the abortion and the child's mother. And the rapist? He's in protective custody now, but apparently his sins aren't so grave as to merit expulsion from his church. When asked why, Sobrinho declared abortion the more serious sin.

How does that make sense?

After worldwide outrage erupted, the Vatican backed off. Archbishop Rino Fisichella, President of the Pontifical Academy for Life, said that the excommunication had been a mistake. Ya think?

Not that this signals any real change of heart, since Fisichella was clear that this situation was exceptional because the life of the "innocent child" was at stake. What if she had been 14 or 15 and not nine?

What does it say for any religious policy or organization to effectively take the side of a rapist and to punish people who help and support an abused child, whether or not her life is at risk? In Brazil alone, more than one million women are having unsafe, illegal abortions each year, and this highly-publicized outrage can only make it worse. If doctors fear that they could be expelled from their religious communities even in the most extreme, horrendous cases like this one -- not that any rape is anything but horrendous -- how does that affect their decisions? How can they treat their patients under these conditions? And above all, what will happen to the women?

Can the women of the world really risk a rise in illegal, unsafe abortions?

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), "...women in South America, eastern Africa, and western Africa are more likely to have an unsafe abortion than are women in other regions.... Unsafe abortion is estimated to account for 13% of all maternal deaths worldwide, but accounts for an even higher proportion of maternal deaths in Latin America (17%) and southeastern Asia (19%)."

Would anyone argue that those numbers are acceptable? The difference is, those of us in the reproductive rights community look at statistics like these and see an opportunity to increase our efforts in raising awareness, funding, and access to reproductive health resources -- while radical right wingers look at those numbers and only see that we need to decrease abortions by making them illegal and promoting abstinence-only education.

I wonder, would that have helped the little girl in Brazil?

Here in the United States, President Obama is talking about finding common ground over reproductive rights, including abortion. On the one hand, he nominated pro-choice Gov. Kathleen Sebelius to head the Department of Health and Human Services (and really, where could we use a pro-choice woman more?), lifted the Global Gag Rule, and overturned the limitations on embryonic stem cell research. He also supported the restoration by Congress of access to low-cost birth control, after two years of skyrocketing prices on campuses and at health clinics for low-income women.

On the other hand, the first 15 advisory committee members for the new White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships included only four women, and the group was heavily stacked with anti-choice members (note: many groups have proposed additional advisory committee members, but none have yet been named). While the official press release states that one of the office's top four priorities is to "be one voice among several in the administration that will look at how we support women and children, address teenage pregnancy, and reduce the need for abortion..." thus far there are few members who have any record of supporting women and children. In addition, "reducing the need" for abortion is being picked up by the media as meaning the Obama administration will reduce the number of abortions -- which is most often accomplished by restricting availability and creating roadblocks. And it didn't help when the head of the new office, Pentecostal minister Joshua DuBois, spoke in an interview with Christianity Today of "reducing the number of abortions" rather than reducing the need by preventing unplanned pregnancies.

I was assured that his phrasing was just a slip of the tongue, which is good -- because there is a huge difference between reducing the need for abortion and reducing the number of abortions. We need to be clear on our goals. When you outlaw abortion, you may decrease the numbers "on the books," but you increase the number of unsafe, illegal abortions. According to WHO, 97 percent of unsafe abortions occur in developing countries, where women have limited or no access to reproductive health coverage. To safely and responsibly reduce the need for abortion, you need to increase access to full reproductive health resources like birth control and family planning. But those methods aren't perfect, so women still need access to safe, legal abortion.

House Republicans already pushed to have a Medicaid family planning initiative stripped from the stimulus package, and across the nation some enemies of reproductive rights are using the economic crisis as a reason to cut back on family planning resources that are especially crucial to lower-income women -- women who are already between a rock and a hard place in this economy -- and we don't need policies that will cement them in poverty.

I hope the new administration and Congress will stay on the path of reproductive justice -- including preventing unwanted pregnancies and making it possible for women to plan and space their children in a way that leads to increased physical and economic health for themselves and their families. I'm counting on our president to resist the temptation to be "everything to everyone" by placating those who would deprive women of their dignity and self-determination. And as we are slowly getting back to our pre-Bush status in terms of women's rights, I hope we will also continue to look ahead. The lives of women and even nine-year-old girls are hanging in the balance.

More Information:

Unsafe abortion: the preventable pandemic, (PDF) World Health Organization (WHO)

Obama Announces White House Office of Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships, White House Press Office

New Director Offers Vision for Faith-Based Office, Christianity Today