The Malaysian Insider :: Opinion
The Malaysian Insider :: Opinion |
| Her health, her body, her choice Posted: 26 Dec 2012 04:13 PM PST DEC 27 ― The recent case in Ireland of 31-year-old Savita Halappanavar, who was denied an abortion of her dying foetus and later died of blood poisoning, has once again brought into sharp relief the question of who really controls a woman's body. This tragic incident, coming soon after the International Day of Action for Safe Abortion (September 28) and the answer to the above question in particular, are especially relevant in societies such as ours which seem to be consistently on a quest for the Holy Grail of "high morality". In many countries around the world, both developed and developing, this quest has claimed many lives. Most belong to women. When I look at the recent Ministry of Health data on teenage pregnancies which was shared during a seminar last September, I can only think that despite Malaysia having a healthcare system better than a number of neighbouring developing countries, we continue to do a disservice to many of these women and girls. The Ministry of Health (MOH) reported that in 2011, 18,652 girls between the ages of 10 and 19 were found to have been pregnant and had sought medical assistance or pregnancy-related treatment in its facilities; 4,222 were unmarried. At the Obstetrics and Gynaecology department of the Tengku Ampuan Rahimah Hospital in Klang, out of 12,000 babies delivered annually, around 1,600 are born to girls below the age of 19. The youngest girl to give birth at that hospital was 12. There are intended pregnancies and then there are unintended pregnancies. Many of the pregnancies mentioned above were unintended. There are many possibilities for the latter. Unprotected sex, obviously. Maybe it was their first time and they didn't know what they were doing. Didn't use contraceptives of any kind or not being able to even have the option to use one to begin with. The condom broke. Rape. What I do know is that for many women, young girls and even children (as in the case of the 12-year-old) in our country, the eventual outcome of an unintended pregnancy is childbirth. Utopia, idealism and religion would say that every child is wanted but we know that to be untrue. All we need to do is look at the occupants of orphanages and welfare homes, the data on the abandonment of babies at roadsides, dumpsters, mosques, temples and hospitals. Consider this. A teenager has double the chance of dying from pregnancy or childbirth complications than women in their twenties. As such, MOH considers them to be high risk pregnancies. A woman faced with an unintended pregnancy has four possible options: keep the pregnancy and marry the father (or rapist. Yes, this happens in Malaysia too); carry the pregnancy to term and put up the baby for adoption; go through an abortion; or dump the baby somewhere at birth. The reality is that the law, religion and society place the burden of responsibility of pregnancy squarely on the shoulders of women. This is why it is essential for women to have the ability to decide whether or not to carry a pregnancy to term. It has implications for every aspect of her life from educational and career aspirations to economic status. Basically her ability to live the life she planned. A teenage girl forced to carry her unintended pregnancy to term could be deprived of an education, future job opportunities and a different life. She might be desperate enough to go through unsafe abortion or try DIY methods of inducing an abortion. In the process, she could die. That is why it is necessary to provide safe abortion services where the termination of a pregnancy is done by trained health care providers using correct, sanitary technique and proper equipment. It needs to be provided not only through private clinics or hospitals but also at government healthcare facilities. It is a simple health service which prevents the complications of unsafe abortions such as infections and infertility. It also saves lives. Abortion is legal in Malaysia. Many people, including many medical professionals, don't know of this fact and mistakenly think that it is an illegal and clandestine practice. Despite a 1989 amendment made to the Penal Code, abortion services continue to not be available in most public hospitals. The reality is that despite the formal existence of the right to a safe and legal abortion, for many women in Malaysia access to abortion services continues to be limited, too tightly regulated or expensive that it is almost entirely out of reach, especially if you are poor, a minority and marginalised. Many cannot afford the often exorbitant fees for abortion services offered by private clinics and hospitals. The reality is that those with money will be able to access and afford abortion. Those who are unable to afford it become statistics and/or criminal cases. We need to also be able to talk freely about contraception and encourage its use. Malaysia's contraceptive prevalence rate has stagnated at around 30 per cent for over 25 years and is a shocking testimony of how we have thus far responded (or not) on issues regarding sexual reproductive health. Want evidence? Look at the data from MOH and the statistics regarding the abandonment of babies and teenage pregnancies. Studies have shown that when contraception is widely available and used, the incidence of unintended pregnancy and abortion both decrease dramatically. We must do better. Often, women and girls are unable to exercise their rights to make decisions regarding their own sexual reproductive health. To begin to address this, we also need proper comprehensive sexual reproductive education for girls and boys which promote the rights of women to determine when and if they want to have children and control over their own sexual health. Abortion is illegal in Ireland. But recently, the Irish government announced that it would draft new laws and regulations to legalise and allow abortion when the health of the mother is at risk. But it took yet another death of a woman for politicians, of whom quite a few are men, to realise the fact that it is a woman's health, her body, and her choice. * This is the personal opinion of the columnist |
| Posted: 26 Dec 2012 03:42 PM PST DEC 27 — Merry Christmas! Gulp down that drink and dash to some rest because 2013 is going to rock, whether millions of Malaysians are ready or not. But first, thanks to those who have continued to read my column and with that said I will raise a glass to you guys, because an unread column is also an over-celebrated diary. I'd like to highlight some of the key issues to envelope the national psyche in 2013 and how they may pan out. Election is now, or soonish The main show for 2013 will be the general election and for the tired Malaysian political pundit, can I say a three-year wait for a general election is tough but there is parallelism in film? The Lord of the Rings trilogy was shot at one go, but viewers had to wait three long years to catch them all as director Peter Jackson released one every year-end. And each film equally underwhelmed me, except when the final edition had a dwarf-tossing scene. A bit like Malaysian politics, except no one has tossed Ibrahim Ali yet. But in the waiting there are social connectors ready to be embraced. Get your office going with election-talk, by getting people to enter a betting pool on when elections will be. (Or join Bila Bubar Parlimen) There can be oodles and oodles of fun day in, day out between strategic meetings and inventory-counts for colleagues to banter about how naive Julia from accounting is, thinking the prime minister wants to hold elections before the 15th day of the Chinese New Year. Once election dates are announced, and the diabolical emails from the mailing list dry up, there is still light at the end of the tunnel as the game of guessing turns to the number of seats Pakatan Rakyat can win in the election proper. Julia from accounting can now take the pisser out of Mike from human resources for not knowing that Batu Kawan and Batu are similar enough, but when you get to Batu Pahat a whole new set of rules apply. As a Pakatan Rakyat operative, I am quite laid back about the delay in the general election, for every day delayed means BN bleeding votes. Surely the uncertainty and lack of confidence is telling, even if the only TV you catch is terrestrial. But like any major fight in Vegas, some of the undercards may just be yummy enough on their own. Like further desertions from Umno and its coalition members. There are those in BN who truly believe that keeping power is possible, but you are likelier to find a mating panda in the shrinking universe of Umno than someone claiming the Semenanjung-based partners will thrive. Then there are those who think that the time of absolute rule has expired. "So, shall I stay or shall I go now" is what's on the repeating short playing list of BN leaders all across Malaysia. It is always poor form to leave when it is convenient, it is nicer to appear to be a risk taker and man of principle, so bolting just before general elections might be the new fad. They have precedence in how PBS ran away just after nomination day in 1990. The real problems of flooding and transportation In 2012 it has become clear that all Malaysian states are prone to flood. What is less clear is the federal government's commitment to contain any future floods, since most of the effort is about spending more money on the problem rather than resolving the key issue — which is about drainage, flood mitigation and clean gutters. Added more, a quarter of Malaysians live in the Klang Valley, and they are about to have compounded problems when the MRT construction goes full-swing. All cities in the world off embarking on a city-wide infrastructure project like the MRT are going to confront the ugly side of city traffic, but when there are no feasible contingencies the combination of floods and constructions is set to turn Klang Valley into mayhem central during peak hours daily. So here we go 2013 is ready for us, whether we want to cling on to a more familiar past. Malaysians are generally caught between thinking that holding on a disappearing past will somehow keep them safe versus walking into the brave new future. As the initial weeks of 2013 will only remind Malaysians too well, that sometimes a need to show courage is no more an option, but that it is an act of survival. That feeling will only grow as the panic about to set in within the ranks of Barisan Nasional leaders will only fester. There is only one reason why the general election will only occur close to full term, there is great uncertainty within the ruling coalition on how the rakyat feel about them. I wager, they've only touched the tip of the iceberg. See you in 2013, I can't wait for it myself! * This is the personal opinion of the columnist |
| You are subscribed to email updates from The Malaysian Insider :: Opinion To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
| Google Inc., 20 West Kinzie, Chicago IL USA 60610 | |
0 ulasan:
Catat Ulasan