Everyone has the right to life-saving interventions during or outside of crises.[ii] And yet, women and girls’ rights to bodily autonomy and safe abortion have been some of the first rights to be conveniently sacrificed under the guise of prioritizing COVID, as if health was a zero-sum game. That includes free, safe and legal abortion and comprehensive abortion and post-abortion care, without which women, girls and gender-non-conforming persons are forced to seek unsafe clandestine abortions or to carry unwanted pregnancies to term, in complete violation of our rights.
Tags: Safe Abortion
INCLO further believes that women and girls have the right of access to appropriate health care services to ensure safe pregnancy and childbirth. The ability of women and girls to decide whether and when to become a parent is a necessary precondition for the achievement of gender equality in all aspects of cultural, economic and political life.
The two thus renew their call for the Egyptian parliament to amend the law in order to guarantee women’s access to safe abortion in cases where pregnancy constitutes a threat to the woman’s life or health, or if the pregnancy is the result of rape or incest.
Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights and the global alliance Realizing Sexual and Reproductive Justice (RESURJ) are again calling on the Egyptian legislator to amend legal provisions on abortion to guarantee women’s access to safe abortion in cases where pregnancy constitutes a threat to the woman’s life or health or if the pregnancy is the result of rape.
