Mass demonstrations against the abortion ban are taking place in Poland

Mass demonstrations against the current abortion ban are taking place in Polish cities on Wednesday. Their participants speak under the slogan “More than one!” and demand to soften the legislation. At the end of May, another woman died due to the procedure not being done on time.

33-year-old Dorota Lalyk, who was in her fifth month of pregnancy, was taken to the hospital after she went into premature labor. Despite the danger of the situation, doctors did not remove the fetus. The fetus died in the mother’s womb a few hours later, but the decision to operate was made only on the third day, when the patient developed a blood infection. Some time after the procedure, she died.

This is not the first case of the death of pregnant women in Polish hospitals. In 2021, a 30-year-old woman died in the city of Pshina. Her unborn child with severe developmental disorders also died in the womb, but the doctors delayed performing an abortion, and the woman died of toxic shock. Actions in her memory were held in more than 80 cities of the country. No fewer than five similar cases are known to the press after the tightening of anti-abortion legislation.

• In October 2020, the Constitutional Court of Poland tightened already one of the strictest European legislations in the sphere of abortions. According to the 1993 law, it was allowed to terminate a pregnancy in case of rape or incest, if pregnancy and childbirth threaten the life or health of the mother, as well as in case of irreversible disability of the fetus. The last item was deleted from this legislation. This led to an almost complete ban on abortion in the country, because it was for this reason that women were most often allowed to terminate a pregnancy. At that time, many thousands of anti-government actions swept across Poland, people demanded the resignation of the right-wing conservative “Law and Justice” cabinet.
• According to human rights organizations, Polish doctors often hesitate to terminate a pregnancy even where it is necessary for vital reasons. If the inspection decides that the procedure was not 100% justified, doctors may face up to three years in prison. A criminal article is also provided for “facilitating an abortion”, according to which volunteers of human rights organizations who help Polish women, for example, are ordered to go to neighboring countries for an abortion.