Ivg.net looks like any other verified, trustworthy website: it comes up first in a web search, it’s neatly organised, welcoming, and it even has a free-of-charge hotline number you can call anonymously, from Monday to Sunday. [IVG is a widely used acronym for a French term for abortion.]
So that’s what Madeleine did when she found out she was seven weeks pregnant and decided she wanted to have an abortion. "I was twenty-three, living in a nine square-metre apartment, had been in a relationship for no longer than two months, and I freaked," said Madeleine, now a lawyer in Paris. When she called the hotline, she was looking for advice but most of all comfort on how to face the prospect of an abortion, she said.
But comfort wasn’t what she got. "They basically told me I’d regret it my whole life: that I would feel relieved at first, but after a while it would haunt me, that I wouldn’t be able to sleep with all of the nightmares," said Madeleine, who asked that her real name not be used.
In France, abortion has been legal for more than 45 years and it’s not at the center of legal or cultural wars as it is in nations ranging from the U.S. to Poland. Yet as Madeleine’s experience shows, access to abortion care can’t be taken for granted in France either. From a host of misleading websites to a shortage of doctors willing to perform the procedure, women seeking abortions face growing obstacles.
In rural areas, a shortage of medical staff willing to perform the procedure, and poorly furnished transport networks are preventing an increasing number of women from getting abortion procedures in due time. At an institutional level, the few existing progress initiatives regarding women’s reproductive rights face growing obstacles. In the wake of a new ‘abortion-ban era’ that has taken western countries by storm, ‘the country of human rights’ is struggling to provide safe abortion care to its citizens: a scenario that painfully echoes Simone de Beauvoir’s famous words: Never forget that it only takes a political, economic or religious crisis for women's rights to be called into question. These rights can never be taken for granted.
One conscience clause a day keeps the doctor away
According to David Lahoule, prevention coordinator for the Plateau de Millevaches’ planned parenthood center, one of the underlying obstacles is the infamous ‘conscience clause’.
It traces back to 1975, and the creation of the french abortion law, also known as the Veil law. At the time, in order to settle down opposition, Simone Veil included a legal clause which allows doctors and practitioners not to provide abortion services for reasons of religion or conscience.
"We want the clause to go", David says, "it’s a serious barrier standing between women and the care they need. It needs to go." The obstacle becomes even more significant when doctors invoking the conscience clause fail to respect their obligation to refer the patient to another doctor, willing to perform the abortion.
What is at stake is not a doctor’s right to choose, but the fact that an abortion-specific clause is uncalled for. As a matter of fact, a regulatory clause of conscience which applies to all medical acts already exists. So what is the point in having a double-conscience clause? Member of Parliament Marie-Noëlle Battistel, a member of the French Socialist Party claims it’s all a matter of stigmatisation: "Why a specific clause for abortion if not to further stigmatise this procedure and keep it from becoming a part of a woman’s normal sexual and reproductive health ?"
A legal, yet punished, medical act
Unlike in Texas, performing an abortion is perfectly legal in France. But medical staff performing the procedures still feel like they are being punished for it. "Economically, it is not an interesting procedure", claims Marie-Noëlle Batistel, "it is paid much less than any other medical procedure, and therefore there is a lack of doctors who feel encouraged to perform it."
On the other hand, a lot of doctors who performed abortions as a part of their political engagement, are now retiring. The lack of economic incentive is preventing them from being replaced by new, younger doctors, who might share the same convictions. A trend confirmed by the latest surveys: 8% of abortion centres in France have closed their doors from 2007 to 2017.
Not only that, doctors who perform an abortion risk being shipped off to rural, more isolated areas, in order to compensate for the lack of medical staff. In France’s rural region Plateau de Millevaches, the only doctor who performed abortions outside the hospitals is soon to be retired.
Rural areas hit the hardest
In 2019, 9% of women had to leave their county in order to access abortion care. While this phenomena happens in every county, it is an everyday reality for rural areas. The time a woman has to travel to get an abortion varies according to where you live, but in Plateau de Millevaches, it may take over an hour to get to the nearest hospital.
"It's complicated because between the moment a woman asks for an abortion, and the moment she gets it, three trips to the doctor’s office are often required." David Lahoule explains. "Not only that, getting to the doctor’s office often requires independent means of transport, which can be a deal breaker for many women."
For women who can’t afford a car, or who can’t afford to tell their parents they need to get an abortion, the situation is tricky. "As it does for asylum seekers", David adds. When thinking of rural areas, one might not instantly think of asylum centres. But in France, many asylum seekers were shipped off to camps in rural areas. "Exiling asylum seekers to rural areas creates a loss of autonomy compared to being in the city: it means women are dependent on the goodwill of workers and structures to be able to move further away and this is quite complicated."
Government and political opposition prevent the law from progressing
Earlier this year, Marie-Noëlle Battistel presented her bill on abortion to the french parliament. In it, not only did she ask for an extension of the time limit, from twelve to fourteen weeks, she also asked that the conscience-clause be taken down, among other things.
"Four or five members of the right (Les Républicains) hit us with 400 amendments. We couldn’t go any further." While Battistel appealed to the government, and its prime minister Jean Castex, she claims they still haven’t gotten any response.
‘Radio-silence’, she says. Last Thursday, she contacted Elisabeth Moreno, Secretary of State attachée to the Prime Minister, responsible for gender equality. "She replied that she was very committed to finding solutions for improving access to abortion, but never actually said the words we're going to extend the time limit. So, yeah, here we are. A law is efficient when it enforces a right, and today that is not the case."
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