Expanding access to legal, comprehensive abortion care in Ethiopia has led to a significant decrease in maternal mortality due to unsafe abortion.
(Updated) What You Need to Know About Restrictions on U.S. Global Health Assistance: The Protecting Life in Global Health Assistance Policy
The Global Gag Rule undermined Ethiopia's progress on reducing maternal deaths due to unsafe abortion.
In 2005, Ethiopian advocates and health providers scored a victory for women and girls when they helped secure a more liberal abortion law that decriminalized the procedure and expanded the circumstances under which it is allowed. Improved access to legal, comprehensive abortion care and an increase in the number of people using family planning have led to a decline in maternal deaths from unsafe abortions.
As one reproductive health professional in Ethiopia told PAI, “When [the government] pushed through safe abortion care, women stopped dying.”
The Ethiopian government, public health experts and civil society know that legal, safe abortion care is critical to saving lives. But the Trump-Pence administration’s expanded Global Gag Rule (GGR) undermined Ethiopia’s progress on reducing maternal deaths due to unsafe abortions by cutting out critical providers from receiving U.S. global health funding.
Under the policy, qualified and trusted health professionals are prevented from providing safe and legal abortion services, including giving patients full and accurate information about their pregnancy options. It further blocks advocates from working with their governments to improve national abortion laws and policies.
The GGR forces foreign organizations to choose between receiving U.S. global health funding and providing comprehensive sexual and reproductive health care to the people they serve. This has led to the closure of clinics and mobile outreach programs that are the trusted — and sometimes sole — sources of family planning and other reproductive health services for marginalized groups in Ethiopia, particularly youth and hard-to-reach rural communities.
The GGR has also damaged long-standing partnerships between health care providers and impeded their ability to integrate sexual and reproductive health services with other vital programs, such as nutrition counseling, HIV testing and maternal health screenings.
The United States is the largest global health donor to Ethiopia and has helped build up and strengthen the country’s health systems. But the GGR is rolling back those achievements, including the country’s own domestic efforts to save women’s lives through progressive abortion policies. In our Access Denied reports, PAI has documented the harmful impacts the policy is having in countries like Ethiopia, giving our allies in Congress direct evidence of the policy’s consequences and strengthening the case for its permanent repeal.
When [the government] pushed through safe abortion care, women stopped dying.Interview from Access Denied Ethiopia
Across the Board, Most Americans Oppose the Global Gag Rule
New Bipartisan Polling from CHANGE and PAI Reveals a Majority of Voters Oppose Banning U.S. Global Health Assistance to non-U.S. Organizations That Provide Abortion Care or Referrals to Women
A bipartisan poll commissioned by the Center for Health and Gender Equity (CHANGE) and PAI released today reveals that across age, education level, gender, race, political party and even abortion stance, the majority of American voters are opposed to “Protecting Life in Global Health Assistance,” also known as the Global Gag Rule. Nearly 60% of voters reject the policy, which prohibits non-U.S., nongovernmental organizations receiving global health assistance from using their own, non-U.S. funds to provide services, information or referrals for abortions, or to advocate for the legalization or liberalization of abortion services.
CHANGE and PAI engaged public opinion research firms American Viewpoint and Lake Research Partners to conduct a joint nationwide survey among voters to determine the favorability of the Global Gag Rule. The first-of-its-kind survey also measured opinions on the U.S.’s role in providing foreign assistance to other countries for medical care.
Findings include:
- Over half (59%) of voters oppose banning U.S. global health assistance to health care organizations in other countries that provide abortions or referrals to women even if they use their own funding. Three-in-ten (30%) favor banning assistance to these organizations.
- Compared to those in favor of it, nearly twice as many Democrats (58%), Independents (57%), and Republicans (60%) are opposed to the ban.
- A solid majority (60%) favor the U.S. providing foreign assistance to other countries for medical care.
“The Global Gag Rule interferes with access to life-saving medical care, including the prevention and treatment of HIV, and is clearly not reflective of American voter values and attitudes. Across party lines, the majority of voters agree: it is health providers—not U.S. politicians—that know what is best for their patients,” says Serra Sippel, president of CHANGE.
“This polling confirms what we’ve always known—access to quality medical care is a bipartisan issue, and letting health providers make decisions about what to do with their own money is common sense,” says Suzanne Ehlers, President and CEO of PAI.
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About CHANGE
CHANGE is a Washington, D.C.-based women’s rights organization that promotes sexual and reproductive health and rights as a means to achieve gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls by shaping public discourse, elevating women’s voices, and influencing the U.S. government. To learn more, visit genderhealth.org.
About PAI
PAI champions policies that put women in charge of their reproductive health. We work with policymakers in Washington and our network of partners in developing countries to remove roadblocks between women and the services and supplies they need. For over 50 years, we’ve helped women succeed by upholding their basic rights. To learn more, visit pai.org.