Canadian Aid: Not for Abortions

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Canada is hosting world leaders for the G8 and G20 summits this week. One of the hot topics of this conference will be the maternal and child health initiatives, a multibillion dollar aid package to improve the lives of women and children in the developing countries. A specific goal of this aid package is to combat the scourge of maternal death due to childbirth.

In Canada, maternal death due to the complications of pregnancy or childbirth occurs in 1 in 11,000 pregnancies. In Africa, 1 in 7 pregnancies results in maternal death. This staggering statistic has finally caught the attention of the world.

In Canada and the United States, activists for maternal health are calling for more funding for contraception and abortion. But Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper says that none of the $1.1 billion Canadian aid dollars will pay for abortions.

Canadian obstetrician Dr. Jean Chamberlain-Froese, founder of Save the Mothers in Uganda, says that changes need to be made at the political level. Much of her work in African countries has involved training local leaders to deliver the kind of cultural and social change that values women and motherhood.

In societies where women are not valued, girls are denied education and told that their only role in society is only to bear and raise children and maintain the home. They are frequently given in marriage long before the legal marriageable age of 16 or 18 which some countries have established, but few have enforced. These child brides have a high incidence of childbearing complications and maternal mortality.

Women in developing countries are generally expected to have their babies at home without medical aid. When complications arise, they often have to wait two days or more before they are taken to the hospital, if indeed there is a hospital near enough and a way to transport her. All too often, by the time a woman in obstructed labour receives medical attention, the situation is life threatening for both mother and child. The ones who survive are often left with fistulas (internal tunnel-like tears). These fistulas can be surgically repaired, but in women who do not have access to this surgery the result is often incontinence. Women with urinary or bowel incontinence are social outcasts for the rest of their lives.

American and Canadian activists for women’s rights who are focusing their attention on easy access to safe abortion for every woman in the world are, in my opinion, advocating a short-sighted solution to a complex situation. I believe that our prime minister is correct in saying that our aid dollars would be better spent providing healthcare for everyone, including pregnant women so that they can have healthy babies. They need to train more midwives and get them into the villages. Girls should be in school and allowed to grow up, so advocates for women’s rights should focus on stopping the practice of child brides.

There is plenty of poverty in the world, and even the five billion dollars that the G8 countries are pledging toward easing some of the pain and despair of the most vulnerable will probably seem like a drop in the bucket. Abortion will be necessary for crisis pregnancies, and there will always be crisis pregnancies. But I for one am proud of my government for wanting our aid dollars to promote life, not death.