V. Ready opposes efforts to decriminalise abortion arguing it is tantamount to murder, and suggests that if you don't want to have a baby, don't get pregnant. I don't know if V. Ready is a man or a woman, but either way, s/he should know that no contraception, bar sterilisation, is 100% effective.
Does V. Ready mean that all women with unintended or unwanted pregnancies, even at 6 or 7 weeks pregnant, should be forced by the state to continue the pregnancy?
Because that is what criminalizing abortion means. S/he doesn't make clear his/her view on early abortion, instead focusing -- as do most opponents of a woman's right to choose -- on later term abortions. These make up fewer than one half of one percent, and at that stage of a pregnancy almost always take place because something has gone terribly wrong with a wanted pregnancy. As research published just this week has showed, women seeking abortions want them as early as possible -- it's the cumbersome, criminalized system we have in place that is delaying access to abortion services by almost a month in many cases. Decriminalisation is not about more or fewer abortions, but about answering the question 'who decides?” Supporters of Steve Chadwick's proposal, and I'm one of them, believe the answer to that question should be that the woman concerned decides, not the government.
Alison McCulloch, Tauranga.