All views and claims expressed in this letter belong solely to the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Dominica News Online.
Dear Editor:
Late in July, in a carefully measured ruling, the High Court gave the Government six months to expand the legal grounds for abortion from the single exception to save the nlife of the woman, to include news indications of rape, incest, severe foetal anomaly and to protect her health.
Then someone asked, “What happens if at the end of six months, the Government has done nothing?”
So, we checked.
It turns out that the language the judge employed was very similar to recommendations in the Concluding Observations of a 2019 report from the Convention for the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) for Antigua and Barbuda.
We thought that was odd. Why not lean on a report about Dominica? After all, we ratified the convention in 1980, almost 50 years ago.
It turns out that we have never submitted a report. CEDAW is still waiting for our initial status report.
So, our government is very skilled in ignoring its obligations. There is little reason to believe that it will be more responsive to the court than to a convention it freely ratified.
By the way, despite that CEDAW recommendation, now seven years old, the Government of Antigua and Barbuda has done nothing at all.
Our research shows that 7 of every 10 women in the Caribbean have had at least one abortion by their mid-forties. So about 7:10 men have contributed to them.
If enforced, the full folly of our current criminal law, would be that all these women and anyone who assisted them in anyway, should have spent several years in jail and should have a criminal record.
As a region, the Caribbean has the highest abortion rate in the world.
https://www.guttmacher.org/fact-sheet/abortion-latin-america-and-caribbean
From our survey in Dominica, we learned that among all women who reported abortions, 81% reported having their first abortion by age 19.
Our criminal laws are a disaster: they have failed us horribly.
We can continue to do what has never worked, or we can try a different approach.
Sincerely,
ASPIRE
ASPIRE is a pro-motherhood, pro-family, pro-choice, non-governmental advocacy group registered in Dominica and five other Caribbean countries. It promotes research and dialogue with civil society and governments to advance fairness and justice in reproductive health.
