Choice Ireland

August 2, 2009
Asylum seekers take pills to end pregnancy because travelling abroad for terminations is to complicated
Mark Tighe

Health workers have detected an increase in the number of asylum seekers resorting to illegal abortions by using herbal and medical pills bought over the internet.

Niall Behan, chief executive of the Irish Family Planning Association (IFPA), said his agency is concerned that women are resorting to illegal abortions because of the expense, time and complexities involved in obtaining permission to travel to Britain or Holland for terminations.

A Health Service Executive (HSE) source who worked with females in asylum centres confirmed that a number of women have presented over the past year with partially aborted foetuses.

According to figures supplied by the Department of Justice, the number of asylum seekers recorded as travelling abroad for abortions has dropped from 33 in 2003 and 22 in 2005 to just one in 2008 and none at all this year.

Women who have applied for refugee status in Ireland are required to live in state accommodation until their application is decided. There were 6,927 people in refugee centres in May. Of these, 951 were single females. An unknown number of women were among the 3,618 people classified as “families”.

Women in centres who want to have legal abortions must get an emergency re-entry visa from the Department of Justice and travel visas from the British or Dutch embassies in Dublin.

“Asylum-seeker women are the same as other women in that they have unplanned pregnancies and foetal abnormalities,” said Behan.

“We’ve been taken aback by how often back-street abortions are mentioned as the only solution. Women don’t know they are actually allowed to travel for this.

“Internet pills or herbal remedies, while not common, seem to be known as the way around this. To buy these things over the internet costs €70 and it’s much more in the reach of these women than the €1,000 it costs to travel to England.”

Behan said women were put off travelling by several factors. “Confidentiality goes out the window,” he said. “She has to tell the embassy staff and the hostel manager the reason she has to travel. The second reason is cost ... For a woman on just over €19 a week it’s impossible.”

Behan said there were also delays of between 14 days to a month waiting for visas from the British embassy.

“Most people agree that terminations should be carried out as early as possible if they have to be carried out,” said Behan. “It’s not good enough for the Irish government to say that’s an issue for the British or Dutch authorities.”