“Access to abortion in Canada is being smothered by pro-life activism. Lock up the pro-lifers and throw away the key.”

That has been the cry across the land from abortionists and women’s groups.

Two years ago, the NDP government of Ontario initiated a lawsuit against 18 pro-life activists who were accused of strangling access to this “legal medical procedure.”

Not only has the court injunction hurt the activists’ ability to counsel women from having an abortion but it has also drained the movement both emotionally

and financially.

Following the lead of their deposed cousins in Ontario, the NDP government of B.C. went one step further and passed Bill 48 or the Access to Abortion Services Act. It is now against law to picket or counsel within designated “bubble zones” which protect abortionists’ homes and offices and, most importantly, the abortuaries and hospitals.

It is too early to tell what effect this will have on B.C. pro-life activists but it is likely that it will resemble Ontario’s distasteful experience: disagreements on how to deal with restrictive measures; jail terms and fines for men and women who cannot afford either; more lives lost to abortion.

Governments across the country have used the access argument as a hammer to smash the rights to Life, Free Speech and Assembly of a certain few. It matters little that that diminishing access to abortion is not even close to being a reality.

In July, Statistics Canada released its annual count on the number of lives lost to abortion. These sobering figures tell the tale of what is truly going on in this country.

For 1993 (the latest figures available) the number of abortions performed in Canada was 104,403, up 2.3 per cent from 1992. There is no reason to believe that this upward trend didn’t continue in 1994 and 1995. the 1993 totals bring the number of lives lost since abortion was legalized to over 1.62 million.

These figures make the governments’ actions completely ludicrous. Where is the lack of access? The already high abortion rates in Ontario and B.C. just keep getting higher and the pro-life movement continues to take it on the chin.

We challenge the lawmakers involved and the Canadian Abortion Rights Action League to provide us with just one example of a woman in this country who cannot get an abortion within 24 hours of deciding to have one. They can’t because the problem just doesn’t exist.

On the other hand, with every little effort, we can show them thousands of cases of patients who are forced to travel long distances to large urban centres only to experience excruciating line-ups before receiving a life-saving treatment.

We have all been touched by stories of the hoops through which cancer patients must jump before they receive treatment – often too late to be effective.

There is a problem with suffering Canadians gaining access to genuine life-saving treatment. We’ve got the personal experience and the hard numbers to prove it.

There is absolutely no problem with abortion accessibility. We’ve got 1.62 million dead babies to prove it.

Pro-abortion groups and sympathetic lawyers have never let a few actual facts get in the way of their arguments.

But take heart. Like the little boy who cried wolf, this method has an unfortunate habit of backfiring.