Medical and midwifery student attitudes toward moral acceptability and legality of abortion, following decriminalization of abortion in Chile.

OBJECTIVE: Soon after Chile decriminalized abortion under three limited circumstances in 2017, we assessed medical and midwifery students' attitudes about abortion morality and legality when compared to national opinions. STUDY DESIGN: We administered an anonymous, online survey to medical and midwifery students from seven secular and religiously-affiliated universities in Santiago, Chile. We compared student responses to a nationally representative public opinion survey. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: We examined three main outcomes related to abortion attitudes: (1) moral acceptability of abortion and legal support for abortion in (2) one or (3) all listed circumstances. We used general estimating equations to examine whether university type, field of study, and other student characteristics are associated with each outcome and compared student views toward abortion legality with those of the general public. RESULTS: Among the 369 student respondents, most agreed that abortion can be a good thing for some women in some situations (82%). When compared to the general public, a larger proportion of students supported decriminalizing abortion in at least one (83% and 97%, respectively) or all (17% and 51%, respectively) seven listed circumstances. While secular university students held significantly more favorable views about abortion morality and legality than students from religiously-affiliated universities, the majority of students from both university types supported abortion in the three cases in which it was recently decriminalized. CONCLUSIONS: Medical and midwifery students from not only secular but also religiously-affiliated universities are very supportive of the recent decriminalization of abortion, which presents training opportunities for both types of universities.

El aborto no punible. Algunas consideraciones bioéticas y legales / Nonpunishable abortion. Some bioethical and legal considerations

El aborto no punible (ANP) es aquél permitido por la ley. Pero ciertamente aún hoy en día existen en nuestro país barreras administrativas que enfrentan las mujeres en condiciones de acceder a un ANP. A partir del fallo de la Corte Suprema de Justicia de la Nación, "F.A.,L. s/ medida autosatisfactiva", ha resurgido la necesidad de establecer protocolos intrahospitalarios de atención de los ANP, de modo de garantizar el acceso a una práctica legal y segura, para todas las mujeres que se encuentren dentro de las previsiones de la norma (Art. 86 Código Penal) (AU)

Justifiable abortion is the one that is allowed by law. Even now women who are in condition of gaining access to a justifiable abortion are faced with administrative odds. Our National Supreme Court declaration in re "F.A.,L. s/ medida autosatisfactiva", has set the duty to establish hospital protocols in order to assist women in need of a justifiable abortion, and guarantee the access to a safe and legal practice for all women who are protected by law (art. 86 Criminal Code) (AU)

"After birth" abortion: a biomedical and conceptual nonsense.

Recently, two authors suggested that killing a healthy newborn might be morally permissible, subsuming it under the heading of 'after birth abortion'. Their proposed new definition implies that infanticide should be permitted whenever II trimester abortion for social reasons is. The suggestion stirred public outcry; nonetheless it needs to be analyzed since some 20% of countries allow II trimester abortion for social reasons and 5% do this on demand. A proper delimitation of the definition of "abortion" is thus very important to ensure careful application; for this reason we have attempted a critical analysis of their arguments. In the area of pregnancy termination different moral standards are apparently applied in different countries, but many reasons exist why the equation between II trimester abortion for social reasons and the killing of healthy neonates is to be morally rejected in all cases. The "inversed reification" of the concept of infanticide as a more abstract, euphemistic 'after birth abortion' blurs the fundamental difference between a non-viable fetus and a viable neonate. The best-known and most widely utilized (although illegal) "social reason" for "late abortion" and "infanticide" is a pregnancy with a female fetus or neonate. If infanticide for neonates were to be considered morally permissible, specifically it is this practice that would be applied. And this should be rejected on two levels: conceptual, through a critique of the exclusive use of one specific notion of personhood, and pragmatic through refusal of gender-discriminatory forms of infanticide (the killing of female neonates). In conclusion, having investigated the new concept we have concluded that the term "after birth abortion" is biologically and conceptually nonsensical.