Ms Christina Zampas:

Human rights bodies, as I said in my presentation, have recommended that countries ensure access to abortion in cases of severe or fatal foetal impairment. They go back and forth and are not always consistent. Looking back at the recommendations over time, they have always been severe. Lately, they use the term “fatal” and sometimes they use “severe or fatal”. It is hard for a legislator or a committee member to decide for a woman how it will impact them. These are very difficult decisions. These are always wanted pregnancies. They get the determination very late and it is a difficult decision to make. Women make those decisions, oftentimes with a heavy heart. We have to keep that real and see that those are not easy decisions for women to make. They are very individual decisions.

The treaty bodies have never said the foetal impairment grounds should be eliminated in a law. The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities recently issued a general comment on women and girls with disabilities. It recommended states should ensure access to sexual and reproductive health services, the same as any other women, taking into consideration their disability and their needs. It never addressed the issue of abortion on the grounds of foetal impairment. That says a lot in its first general recommendation on women with disabilities.

The best way to address the problem of discrimination against persons with disabilities is to address the underlying discrimination. Why is this happening? Society needs to take steps to make the individual's life, but also the family life of the parents, easy. There should be benefits, social and educational supports. It is about time Ireland ratified the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities because it would really help setting its policies straight on helping persons with disabilities. That is the best way to address this. Restricting abortion on impairment grounds is not going to limit access to abortion. Some countries do not have explicit foetal impairment exceptions, but they read health exceptions very broadly to include any sort of health issue.