Five sins abortion never committed Bright Mhango There has been huge and heated debate lately

on the issue of abortion in Malawi, starting with the passing of the Gender Equality Bill and the recent move by Malawi Law Commission to review abortion law in Malawi. There has been opposition to almost everything that has the word abortion in it especially from the religious groupings, but there are a few things that the opposers of abortion and abortion law reform are purporting/assuming that are wrong or misguided. Abortion is not illegal in Malawi Sections 149, 150, 151 and 243 of the Penal Code will reveal that abortion in Malawi is actually legal. It is not illegal as some people say. The only shortfall of the law is that it is restrictive, vague and only allows abortion when the mothers life is threatened, hence the need for reform. Simply the law prohibits self induced abortion including assisting the same under sections 149 to 150 and allows only abortion performed by qualified personnel under section 243 of the penal code. Abortion is alien There is a tendency to deny the existence of the abortion problem in Malawi. Some say abortion is a concept that is being imposed by immoral foreigners. But we all know how untrue this is. We have had abortions in the villages as far as we can remember and there are herbs in the village that many people know are used to abort, they didnt come to Malawi in a boat. Abortion is real, the Ministry of Health assessed the problem by putting enumerators in 166 major hospitals in the country to record the numbers of women who come to the hospitals with abortion complications. The results were published in a 2011 report titled; Abortion in MalawiResults of a Survey of Incidence and Magnitude of Complications due to Unsafe Abortion, the results were heart-wrenching; it turns out 70,000 Malawian women attempt unsafe abortion every year. Abortion is for the immoral/loose women It is a mistake to assume that abortion is for sex workers and or those girls who are loose. The ministry of health survey actually found that 81 percent of the 70,474 women that induced abortions in 2009 were married and 49 percent were under the age of 25 and over half of them are rural dwellers.

Again the research found that most of the people who sought abortion services are those that belong to famous faith groups in the country. What this means is that there is grand hypocrisy in the country, most town dwellers have abortions if they want because they have money and yet turn a blind eye as the rural masses perish all in the name of preserving the image of a God fearing nation. The truth is abortions are out there and one health assistant in Zomba told journalists on a recent field tour that he has seen many leaders faith groups coming to hospital with abortion complications. This means that as much as we deny it, it will keep reigning underground so far the abortion rate is 24.4 induced abortions per 1000 women aged 15-44 (range 17.6 - 31.2) Lets concentrate of contraception Many opponents of abortion say we should hush abortion talk and concentrate of contraception and abstinence. This is actually a good approach but it lacks width and insight. Almost one quarter (23 percent) of women who had induced abortions as reported in the Ministry of Health survey reported using some form of contraception at the time of pregnancy. Moral of the story? Contraception is not 100 percent. So what if a women never planned to have a baby? Should they stay away from sex altogether? If they tried preventing conception and yet got pregnant, should they keep it because of the law? Where are womens rights, then? What the civil society via the Coalition for the Prevention of Unsafe Abortion (Copua) is saying is that let us teach abstinence, contraception but still let us give women choice. That is what the Gender Equality Act of 2013 will try to address by giving women the power to decide whether to have or not have a baby. History has shown that law does not stop a woman from attempting abortion, the more restrictive the law is, the more the dangerous methods they attempt. For example, some women are poor, some are raped, some are tricked into unprotected sex and the list of tricky situations can go on and on, if we let them decide when to have or not have children, they will not be forced to attempt suicidal methods such as poking their uterus with bicycle spokes or sticks.

Take note that World Health Organisation advises all countries to provide access safe abortion even where family planning methods are up to date. Pro-abortion law cannot work Well, it can. Lets take the example of Romania, in the early 60s abortion was permissible in the East European nation, there was actually acceptable levels of mothers dying due to maternal issues. The law was changed and abortion restricted through the 70s and 80s and the maternal deaths also skyrocketed a rate which was to drop sharply at the onset of the 90s after the law was re-reversed. The same with South African where maternal mortality dropped by 91 percent when more liberal on abortion was passed. Lesson? Restricting abortion is actually a death sentence to women. In Malawi Approximately 17 percent of maternal deaths in Malawi are attributable to unsafe abortion, making it one of the primary causes of maternal mortality. 30 percent of all admissions in countrys gynecological wards are due to unsafe abortion. So we have to choose, do we sit here and debate whether abortion is about when life starts or not or we are going to man up and face up to the reality in our society? Malawi has signed a lot of agreement coined by serious technocrats and they all recommend providing abortion options as a way of reducing maternal mortality. The Maputo Plan of Action, for example. Malawi can always learn how our fellow Africans have addressed the matter, countries such as South Africa, Zambia, Ethiopia, Seychelles, Tunisia, Ghana and Cape Verde. It has been proved that in countries where abortion is legal and services are available, the rate of unsafe abortions is lower than in legally restricting environment. It is not like abortions will be rampant after the law is flexed, women will still give consent and the country will have to follow guidelines as laid down by the World Health Organisation... We can either get progressive or still go to funerals and cry crocodile tears as our women die. Malawian tax payers have to cough MK350 Million every year to treat abortion complications; do we not have better sectors that need this humongous amount?