The Abortion Pill is coming - But it doesn't mean access in Saskatchewan

In July of 2015, the abortion pill was given the okay by Health Canada in terms of its legality. Its rollout has already begun earlier this year, mostly in major cities. Most of its proponents have called this a big win in terms of increasing access to abortion in Canada. The abortion pill, which is patented as Mifegymiso in Canada, has jumped through various legal barriers to get to this point. Commonly known as Mifepristone, the ‘abortion pill’s’ advocates have been fighting for its legalisation and access for years. In fact, advocates often cite France’s adoption of the abortion pill more than twenty-five years ago as being an effective and safe route for people seeking to abort there.

Saskatchewan has an Abortion Problem

Saskatchewan has long had a problematic relationship with accessing abortions, even though it has been technically legal and protected since the Morgentaler ruling in the late 1980’s. Saskatchewan only has three private clinics (all in Saskatoon and Regina), and three hospitals which provide abortive services. You can find the specific clinics and hospitals listed here. Because of the geographically sparse nature of the province, and the ties that geography has with socio-economic disparity, Saskatchewan’s abortion rates per pregnancy have remained low. Important to note is that while high abortion rates themselves should not be seen as inherently a good thing (birth control, sex education, and available childcare can all either be preventative or alleviating measures for unwanted pregnancies), Saskatchewan is undoubtedly a province with an access deficit. Rural and on-reserve folks may have a difficult time finding their way to these clinics or hospitals given financial barriers or social stigmas. As it stands, the provincial government has no reimbursement strategy for travel to receive these procedures within the province. Now, with the public provincial bus service permanently closing, even more barriers are being created for these people.

Scratched: The Wall government has cancelled all of its funding to the STC in its latest budget.

The Abortion Pill is not an Answer to that Problem

The question is, will the rollout of this so-called ‘abortion pill’ make abortion more accessible? Long answer – maybe, short answer – no. And definitely not in its current legislation. In order to get passed through the Harper government the bill had to be subject to some unfortunately restrictive amendments. For example, as opposed to normal pharmaceutical rollouts, the stocking and preparatory processes for the drug are going to be handled by physicians instead of by pharmacists. There exists another stipulation which means that people who take the pill will need to be supervised by physicians. These amendments are counterintuitive to the policy itself, and will restrict the pill’s access. Numbers tell us that even without these additional amendments, the ‘abortion pill’ in and of itself will not make abortion easier to come by. If the pills are only available within the same confinements as the abortive process itself, then most people will not be affected much differently by it. In terms of addressing the socio-economic and geographic barriers to abortion access, the pill by itself fails.

Abortion Pill: The patent in Canada is Mifegymiso, and it rolls out this year.

 So what Answers are there?

A large problem here is the liberal concept of abortions being a ‘negative’ and not a ‘positive’ right. The norm in Canada has largely favoured a ‘negative’ version of abortion, where governments cannot interfere with a person’s right to abort. Certainly, the federal government has fought hard to ensure that provincial governments must fund abortive services (including private clinics), and to ensure that provincial governments cannot introduce their own legislation directly impeding or repealing access to these services. However, the current legislation has still led to most provinces not willingly increasing access in any ways, and has made abortion clinics entirely dependent upon the willingness of citizens to establish, staff, and operate them This laissez-faire attitude is in stark contrast Quebec’s policies of more calculated implementation. In Quebec, as with many European countries, there has been a willingness to view abortion as a ‘positive’ right – one which the government needs to actively work to enforce and preserve, while respecting the person’s right to choose. At the same time, Quebec has allowed women to influence how women want to access abortions. Because of this, Quebec by far has the highest abortion rates in Canada. This also is in no small part due to the positioning of more than thirty clinics or abortion-ready hospitals in geographically diverse parts of the province.

At the end of the day, the rollout of the ‘abortion pill’ won’t give people the access that they need to abortive services. There is a much larger problem of established norms and conventions which prevent the services which need to exist in certain communities from doing so. In order to make meaningful change in closing this dire access deficit, the government needs to put more funding into the operation of these services in areas where they are desperately needed. Grassroots activism needs to keep pushing this narrative so that the government has reason to listen. Right now, unfortunately, the ‘abortion pill’ in Canada does not seem to be much more than window-dressing.

---------------------------------------Works cited---------------------------------------------------------------------

Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada. "List of Abortion Clinics in Canada." January 26, 2017. 

Britten, Liam. "Restrictions on coming 'abortion pill' are 'demeaning' to women, says prof." CBC News. April 22, 2016.

CBC News. "Abortion barries still exist in Sask. 25 years after historic ruling." CBC News. January 28, 2013.

Gladwell, Malcolm. "French abortion pill safe and effective, study says." Washington Post. March 8, 1990.

Government of Canada. "Population by year, by province and territory (Number).” Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. September 26, 2016.

Government of Canada. "Pregnancy outcomes by age group (Total pregnancies)." Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. August 20, 2008.

Government of Canada. "Pregnancy outcomes by province or territory of residence (Total Pregnancies)." Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. October 25, 2010.

Hoffman, James. "STC has served Saskatchewan well." Regina Leader-Post. March 31, 2017.