Rebecca Oas, Ph.D.
WASHINGTON, D.C., January 5, 2017 (C-Fam) — A recently-released study estimates that abortion in India is 20 times higher than previous estimates – 15.6 million children aborted in 2015 alone. The news led abortion advocates to call on New Delhi to liberalize India’s abortion law even further, past the 20-week gestation limit, even though India’s law is already among the most liberal of its kind in Asia.
The study, published by the pro-abortion Guttmacher Institute, reported that despite the law, most of these abortions take place outside legally approved facilities and are done by medications without a prescription. However, a comment published alongsidefor the study in The Lancet, co-authored by the director of a World Health Organization (WHO) research institute on human reproduction, stressed that not all illegal abortions are necessarily considered by WHO to be unsafe.
India’s Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act (MTPA), adopted in 1971, allows for abortion on demand under 12 weeks of pregnancy, while abortions between 12 and 20 weeks require two doctors’ approval. Beyond 20 weeks, abortion is only permitted to save the life of the mother.
In an editorial published on the Indian digital platform
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