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    Why is abortion highly restricted in Poland while in most other European countries it is not?
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    Why is abortion highly restricted in Poland while in most other European countries it is not?

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    46 Comments

    1. 5thhorseman_ on

      Because we had an idiot government several years back which pushed it through despite wide public outcry against, and the chief party involved still has the president and enough seats in the Sejm to block any attempts to overturn presidential veto.

    4. stressedoutbadgerboi on

      We’re living in a right-wing hell that completely ignores the public backlash. “Czarny protest” was a huge thing, but even though it lasted for so many days, people were ignored. Now nobody’s marching and instead more groups of Russian propagandists want even more restricted laws on that matter. They also want to make divorces illegal, the ultimate hypocrisy if you look at their own actions.

    7. Meggy_bug on

      Quite a lot of people here are.. well, to put it in quite offensive way – dumb. Even positive changes such as introducing an important new subject in schools about health is met with huge backlash, then imagine how mad some people would be if abortion was legal (interestingly, childless people here would be most furious it seems lmao)

      We also have very bad demographic situation and this is one of many idiotic ways we try to deal with it instead of idk, maybe not discriminating parents on the job market.

    10. iSailor on

      Because Poland is little USA so we had to transplant their pro-life movements onto our soil in mostly unchanged fashion.

    12. Babybluevalo on

      If we allow abortion for women as a choice we should allow financial abortion for men. Why all men should pay child support for 18 years when women can just do abortion? Child support from father should only be optional

    15. ClockworkOrdinator on

      Basically the ruling party pis decided to be evil for the fun of it and tighten the laws.

      Even moderates and some *conservatives* protested this in the street but nothing happened.

    17. Syaman_ on

      It seems like each government that is elected is more conservative than the general population

    19. andrusbaun on

      Because church gained too much authority after 1989. Before that we had quite liberal law. Church could and still can influence voters. Even if more progressive government wins the elections, president (which is elected by conservative majority) can veto it.

      Current government cannot change the law because of Nawrocki (and Duda before).

      Fortunately, Polish mentality is quite flexible, no one is really interested in executing this law, and it is not difficult to terminate pregnancy ‘outside’ the system.

      Unfortunately, current law complicates things when something unexpected happens during pregnancy and patient ends up in hospital. In few cases doctors were afraid or unwilling to terminate what resulted in several dire incidents.

      While in larger cities (and majority of smaller ones) vast majority of doctors is sensible on this matter… someone in more rural location may end up under care of some conservative twat.

      Topic of abortion is politicized and utilized by some pro-Russian ultra-conservative organizations.

      TLDR: Abortion is broadly available in grey-zone, but ironically women who want to give birth may end up in terrible situation in the event of complications. Additionally, current state of affairs discriminates those who are in poor financial situation.

    20. ZielonaKrowa on

      Lots of people here say that it’s Christianity/ Catholicism or straight up dumb people.
      In reality it’s because after conservatives banned it in the early in the 90 then ex commies (today’s Left ironically) agreed for a constitution that has an article:
      “Everyone has a right to live” the end. And later on in law it is codified that unborn children are eligible to inheritance. So whenever anyone wants to loosen the restrictions it ends up in constitutional tribunal that has no other choice as to say: it is illegal according our constitution because it’s so straight forward that there is no room for interpretation. 
      What’s more is that if any right wing lunatic ever ask tribunal if it is legal to abort a baby if there is a risk to mothers life it will have to say no. It is not legal. Thanks SLD. You wrote brain dead constitution. 

    23. EarthAndSawdust on

      Because fanaticism.

      Edit, to be precise, our catholic government once said, that in case of Jesus being reborn, we cannot chance him getting aborted.

    24. Melowicz on

      Wait a minute- Does recently all of the countries start allowing abortion? I saw once a map and it showed more countries in Europe not allowing fully abortion

    32. Diss_ConnecT on

      I see people blaming PiS but we’d still be red on the map before 2020 too. In 1997 the socioeconomic factor (yellow on the map) was ruled unconstitutional and since then we’re stuck with one of the most restrictive abortion laws in Europe. The 2020 ruling removed another case allowing abortion of malformed fetuses which was something around 1000 abortions per year (compared to estimated 25-100k abortions done outside of the system). Don’t get me wrong, I’m not defending PiS, just saying it wasn’t much better before 2020 changes.

      Also, in 2019 we’ve had 1100 legal abortions. In 2021 it was cut down to 100. In 2024, despite some people claiming nothing changed, we’ve had 900 legal abortions again thanks to the new government changing official recommendations and regulations in hospitals. You might not notice it since it’s still highly restrictive, but things changed for the better again.

    33. jimmymuir9 on

      Why? Look at the comments.

      People try to solve it on the ground of ethics, not realising it leaves you with two tragic choices and sour taste in mouth. Those who have polarized opinions then attempt to quantify suffering, dehumanize babies or stigmatize mothers.

      It’s not going to change because media always use it as a replacement topic and they can keep grilling it forever this way riling up both sides.

    36. paszczakun on

      thats really good question we ‘all’ ask here in Poland 🙂
      For some reason catholic church still has a lot of influence her. Mostly due they have regained suprisingly much power when socialism in Poland has fallen

    38. UnDebs on

      “life at risk” bruh there were a lot of cases when women straight up died because doctors were forcing them to carry through dead fetus, they don’t give a shit about the women or the children

    41. Pepphen77 on

      Funny thing is that back in the day, women from Sweden travelled to Poland to get an abortion.

    42. Lumpy_Asparagus_5151 on

      Its a recent legislation. This is what far-right retardness do to your country. If the new liberal government got a president last year that would be already abolished. Instead we have to stick with what we have

    43. KondzioBondzio on

      The truth is that one old crypto-gay is taking revenge on the Polish nation because it dared to broadcast a “zimny Lech” commercial on TV after the death of his better twin brother.

    46. Czesiu_9 on

      It’s actually not true that in Poland they allow abortion for health reasons. Multiple women died in the past few years since they restricted it even more. Look it up