China Cracking Down on Abortions

China Cracking Down on Abortions

(UnitedReader.com) – China has restricted the size of families to avoid overpopulation in the past. Now, decades later, those policies seem to have come back to haunt the Chinese government, as they attempt to stifle abortions that are not deemed medically necessary.

The country recently endorsed a three-child policy, allowing families to have three children as China faces a decline in its population. Nevertheless, officials announced on September 27 that they intend to decrease abortions that aren’t for medical purposes. Chinese authorities appear determined to force a population increase using a variety of methods.

Health experts in China believe abortions harm the reproductive abilities of women, leading to infertility. A researcher for Human Rights Watch, Yaqiu Wang, noted that the move to reduce abortions is essentially the same as the one-child policy. Instead of the government forcing women to get abortions to adhere to the one-child policy, the government is now telling women they cannot get the procedure for non-medical reasons.

Wang doesn’t know what the government’s list of non-medical reasons includes, but she does include that women from all over the world have died because they lacked access to safe abortions. The move comes as China’s birth rate went down from 11.8 million new birth registrations in 2019 to 10 million in 2020.

Arguably, a variety of valid reasons exist to support the global pro-life movement and oppose abortion. However, some people question China’s decision to ban the practice as part of an overall strategy to control the population.

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