ABORTION RELATED ARTICLES

C is for Control of My Own Body: Options on abortion law reform

The final report of the Victorian Law Reform Commission (VLRC) was tabled in state parliament on 29 May, outlining three options to guide the Government in removing abortion offences from the Crimes Act 1958. The report was based on wide consultation and thorough research, and provides a comprehensive, evidence-based overview of current abortion legislation, policy and practice, and options for decriminalisation...

Read the full article written by Robyn Gregory, Chief Executive Officer, and Cath Mayes, Sexual and Reproductive Health Coordinator, Women's Health West.

Victorian Abortion Law Review: towards improving the status of women

When we talk about women's rights, we can get all the rights in the world … and none of them means a doggone thing if we don't own the flesh we stand in, if we can't control what happens to us, if the whole course of our lives can be changed by somebody else that can get us pregnant by accident, or by deceit, or by force (Luker, 1984:97).

Read the full article written by Robyn Gregory, Chief Executive Officer, Women's Health West.

Pro-Choice Counselling

On 2 January this year the Federal Government awarded a tender for a national pregnancy support help line to McKesson Asia Pacific - an agency that will subcontract the development of counselling training to Centacare (Catholic Family Services) and Caroline Chisholm. The government chose to exclude counsellors who currently provide unplanned pregnancy counselling, apparently in response to concerns from 'pro-foetus' groups about bias in abortion counselling.

Read the full article written by Robyn Gregory, Chief Executive Officer, Women's Health West.

Women's right to control their own bodies across the continuum from abortion to access to assisted reproduction

Women's right to reproductive control is once again under threat. The Federal Government has proposed legislation that, if passed, would give the health minister the power to restrict Medicare funding for some types of surgery, including abortion and reproduction-aiding technologies. State Health Minister Bronwyn Pike proposed a 'cooling off' period for second trimester abortions, suggesting that women are not capable of making unassisted decisions...

Read the full article written by Robyn Gregory, Chief Executive Officer, Women's Health West.

Hardly Her Choice: A History of Abortion Law Reform in Victoria

The last years have seen 'abortion' become a controversial topic; one that is frequently debated in public, political and policy arenas. Yet, however strange this might sound, there seems much in common between the current form of the disputation and the public dramas that occurred around abortion in the 1960s and 70s...

Read the full article written by Robyn Gregory, Chief Executive Officer, Women's Health West.

History of abortion law reform in Victoria

Readings/Royal Women's Hospital event for launch of Jo Wainer's book 'Lost: stories of illegal abortion'

My talk today is based on work I undertook for a doctorate, examining the history of abortion law reform in Victoria. I found masses of information, meticulously recorded. Yet what it raised was often quite the opposite - scandal, corruption, gossip, intrigue, drama and vested interests - in a long, fascinating and complicated series of sagas that I can only give you a taste of in the next ten minutes...

Read the full article written by Robyn Gregory, Chief Executive Officer, Women's Health West.

The Difficulties Young Rural Women Face in Trying to Obtain Surgical Terminations of Pregnancy

Abortion in Australia remains a contentious and often fiercely debated public issue. While the vast majority of Australians support women's legal right to freely choose abortion, there is "strong community support for a reduction in abortion numbers". The desire for fewer terminations is supported by politicians, the media and indeed the general public...

Read Elly Taylor's full Postgraduate Diploma thesis in Gender Studies, Faculty of Art, The University of Melbourne.

Depression and termination of pregnancy

Depression and termination of pregnancy (induced abortion) in a national cohort of young Australian women: the confounding effect of women's experience of violence

Read the full article written by Angela J Taft and Lyndsey F Watson, Mother and Child Health Research, La Trobe University.

WOMEN'S STORIES AND EXPERIENCES

Stories from women trying to access a safe abortion

While the majority of the population support women's reproductive choice, women regularly tell us that securing an abortion can be very difficult because its legal status is unclear. Women's health services have gathered and recorded some of those stories.

Read stories from women trying to access a safe abortion (PDF)229KB

Abstract

The aim of this research is to understand the impact of the grey legal status of abortion in Victoria on women's access to abortion by drawing together key informants' understandings and awareness of issues relating to women's access.

Read the full research project by Cath Mayes, Master of Public Health at the Key Centre for Women's Health in Society, University of Melbourne

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