On Friday the 16th of December, the IFPA made a submission to the Citizens' Assembly on the issue of the Eighth Amendment of the Constitution. The submission is based on our long track record of providing sexual and reproductive healthcare to women, including pregnancy counselling and post-abortion care. We wanted to help ensure that women's experiences are heard in the context of the Assembly's discussions. We also wanted to make clear the ways in which Ireland's law on abortion affects us, as medical healthcare providers, by preventing us from providing women with the level of care that fully respects their right to the highest attainable standard of health.
From our experience as healthcare providers, we know that women's decisions about whether to continue with a pregnancy are intensely personal and complex. This complexity cannot be captured in a constitutional clause. It is the firm view of the IFPA that the Eighth Amendment must be repealed, and replaced with a regulatory framework to guarantee that women in Ireland have the right to legal abortion services and that these services are accessible, affordable, of high quality and respectful women’s dignity and rights.
Download our submission.