Reality of Abortion
Abortion was first legalised in 1969 under Pierre Trudeau. It was slipped into an Omnibus Bill that affected many changes. One of these changes was that abortion would be legal if a panel of doctors decided that abortion was necessary for the health of the mother. Health was very broadly defined and could mean anything from mental health to social health to emotional health to economic health. Ultimately, abortion became one of the most common procedures in Canada.
Matters only worsened in 1988 when Henry Morgentaler challenged the law in the Supreme Court. The abortion law was struck from the criminal code. As a result, Joe Borowski’s concurrent case to have the legal rights of the preborn recognised was dismissed. This resulted in abortion being legal in Canada for any reason and at all times up until birth.
Canada is unique in being one of the very few countries in the world to allow abortion through all nine months for any reason at all. Canada is also unique in that the reason for this widespread access is because preborn children are not acknowledged as a person or even a human being until they are born. If you go to the government site to see the criminal code, it will define when a child "becomes a human being":
When child becomes human being
- 223(1) A child becomes a human being within the meaning of this Act when it has completely proceeded, in a living state, from the body of its mother, whether or not
- (a)it has breathed;
- (b)it has an independent circulation; or
- (c)the navel string is severed.
- Marginal note:Killing child
(2) A person commits homicide when he causes injury to a child before or during its birth as a result of which the child dies after becoming a human being.
The unscientific notion that a child who is not fully born is not a human being has had some troubling implications. There was a case in the '90s, for example, where a mother of three who was 22 weeks pregnant with her fourth child was put into custody because she was addicted to glue sniffing. Despite the fact that two of her children were believed to have been born disabled due to this habit, the case was dismissed. An unborn child has no rights under the law and therefore there was no case. This would seem to imply that any pregnant woman could be prescribed thalidomide and this might be considered acceptable.
There was another case where parents tried to sue for criminal negligence when a child died in labour from asphyxiation. Despite the fact that the child’s head was already outside of the birth canal when this happened, there was no case. The child was not born and therefore had no rights. Whether or not criminal negligence was or was not present was irrelevant.
More recently, in 2010, a bill for Roxanne’s Law was voted down even though it was to prevent forced or coerced abortions. Roxanne was a young woman who had been murdered by her boyfriend for refusing an abortion. The act of voting down this bill would seem to imply it is okay to force people to get abortions.
Likewise, in 2012, a motion to make sex-selective abortion illegal was also voted down. It remains acceptable to abort a child on the grounds of their sex in Canada. This typically affects women more than men as female babies are more likely to be aborted.
While abortion comes under the category of “healthcare,” it is regulated by the provincial government who may apply restrictions. Provinces may forbid abortions past a certain period. However, with no federal law, there is often pressure to increase access. P.E.I., for instance, faced financial and legal pressure if they did not provide abortion. If abortion is legal for any reason up until full birth, why then should a province stop it? Barriers to abortion access are often decried as being in opposition to Canadian federal law.
Abortion Access Specifically in Nova Scotia
In Nova Scotia, abortions can happen up to fifteen weeks without parental consent or knowledge. The lack of parental involvement is an unfortunate reality as, especially in the case of very young girls, abortion can be used to cover up sexual abuse and/or trafficking. Additionally, medication abortions can be had thorugh self-referral.
When medication abortions were initially legalised in the province, it was required that women receive an ultrasound first to determine gestational age. This is because the abortion pill is only to be taken up to nine weeks and also to ensure that there is no ectopic pregnancy. While ultrasounds are recommended, they are no longer necessary as of August 2019. Concerns about delay in access were cited as a reason. However, as ectopic pregnancies are a significant cause of maternal death when getting a medication abortion, ultrasounds remain the best and safest way to know if a woman is at risk. This is all the more important considering that the number of ectopic pregnancies in women has risen in recent decades. This rise has been associated with both a rise in STIs and abortions. Hence, women may find themselves facing greater risk.