Myth Busting Monday - pro-choice orgs don't care about pregnancy counselling

The Dorries/Field amendment on abortion counselling is based on the false premise that women cannot currently access impartial support with pregnancy decision-making . Whether or not they expect their amendment to be successful, it is obvious that the main intention of the amendment is to promote the view that:
• those who provide abortion are hell-bent on encouraging women to have abortions they do not really want
• those who support access to safe, legal abortion don't care about whether women make the right decision about abortion


As an organisation that believes women should have easy access to good quality abortion services, EFC has worked very hard to improve the level of support that young women and their partners get with pregnancy decision-making. 


For ten years EFC has delivered a training course for school nurses, youth workers, sexual health workers, teachers, social workers (in fact anyone who works with young people). This provides tools and information to help professionals provide impartial support with pregnancy decision-making. It recognises that young people may find this process difficult – they may lack: knowledge and understanding of the different pregnancy options; the skills to assess their thoughts and feelings and weigh up the benefits and disadvantages of parenthood; or the support at home to decide what’s best for them.  Young people may not want to go to their GP and may not know how to access an abortion provider directly for information or support. It’s important that the professionals who young people trust are able to provide this support when and where they ask for it.


Education For Choice has written a toolkit to encourage and enable professionals to provide support with pregnancy  decision-making to the young women and men they work with. The toolkit makes the case for providing this support when and where it is needed and includes practical information and ideas on how to do so. It also provides a checklist for professionals and local area commissioners to assess the quality, impartiality and usefulness of local independent pregnancy services.


Education For Choice has published a workbook of practical tools and exercises to help those professionals working with young people to work through their decision-making process with them and to create a document of the process to increase young women’s confidence in their decision.


As a pro-choice organisation we’re really committed to good quality pregnancy decision-making support.

Myth Busting Monday - Abortion counselling legislation protects women

A common myth is that abortion is traumatic and dangerous for women's mental health. In many parts of the United States doctors are mandated to provide women with specific information on the psychological risks of abortion. The information is not always scientifically accurate or evidence-based. The doctors do not choose what information they have to give out. The state governments often determine this after aggressive lobbying from the anti-abortion movement. So, women going for a safe, legal medical procedure may be, for example, advised that it is likely to damage her health or lead to mental illness.

So, what is the basis for fears about the impact of abortion on mental health? A recent large and comprehensive study of research literature around the world carried out by the American Psychological Association found that ordinary first trimester abortions (90% of abortions in the UK are first trimester) do not present a risk to a woman's mental health. Most women are able to integrate the experience of abortion into their lives without experiencing psychological problems.

So why would MP Nadine Dorries be holding an adjournment debate tomorrow (02.11.10) proposing that the legal framework for abortion should include mandatory provision of information about psychological risk and 'cooling off periods' - in which women who have freely chosen abortion are told to go away and think more about it and come back after a set number of days - Is it because she wants to improve women's lives and keep them safe?

Actually policies which mandate psychological counselling and 'cooling off periods' are a recipe for increasing delays for women choosing abortion, increasing the number of post 10 week abortions (successfully reduced over recent years), and increasing the anxiety and stress that women experience when seeking abortion. Another insidious, and intended, effect of these policies is to remould the anti-abortion movement as somehow pro-women and to reposition abortion, and by extension abortion providers, as dangerous.

None of this is about the health and wellbeing of women. It's highly ideologically driven and is probably just one of a range of attacks on current abortion law and provision we can expect from the anti-abortion movement in the next few months.


Lisa