Last year when Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper steadfastly refused to include abortion in his maternal health initiative he brought to the G8 summit Canada hosted in June, he was chastised for being out of step with international norms on acknowledging the supposed central importance of abortion in addressing maternal health and infant mortality. But according to the Guttmacher Institute, a pro-abortion research outfit, abortion is increasingly ignored by the international community in addressing maternal health. According to its new report, “Unsafe Abortion: The Missing Link in Global Efforts to Improve Maternal Health”:
Despite the international community’s growing attention to and resources for maternal health, many leading advocates, policymakers and donors—including the United States—are reluctant to even acknowledge the role of unsafe abortion in maternal mortality, much less address it directly.
It seems, in other words, that Canadian policy under the Conservatives is not so greatly at odds with the international community after all.
