With the US Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, Susan Brison remembers her late sister’s decision to have an abortion in 1967, when the procedure was still illegal in Canada.
Brison’s sister, Kate Daller, was 19 at the time, he said. It was after Brison’s family moved from northern British Columbia to Toronto that Daller became pregnant. Having lived in Toronto for only two years, Brison’s family couldn’t find a doctor willing to perform an abortion in the city, she said.
“My mom got in touch with our old GP, who we knew from Vancouver, and she begged him to help us, and he agreed,” Brison told CTVNews.ca in a phone interview Wednesday.
About three months into her pregnancy, Daller flew to British Columbia to have a surgical abortion.
“That poor young girl, terrified, [was] I was put on a plane for an illegal procedure… with a doctor who was horrified,” Brison said. “As I flew home, [she was] hemorrhage [and] She continued to bleed for several days at home before she was finally taken by ambulance to a hospital.”
At the time, Daller stayed in the hospital for a few days and was asked if she had an illegal abortion, Brison said. The doctor who performed the procedure also told Brison’s family never to contact him again.
In the late 1970s, when Brison decided to have an abortion herself, her experience was completely different from that of her sister, who passed away in 2019. Brison was in her early 20s when she became pregnant despite using Dalkon Shield, a contraceptive. intrauterine. device.
“We were poor… We had nothing to offer a child at the time,” Brison said.
Shortly after realizing she was pregnant, Brison saw her general practitioner, who said he supported her decision to have an abortion. As of 1969, it was legal to perform abortions in Canada in limited circumstances. In 1988, the procedure was completely decriminalized. In less than a month, Brison underwent the procedure at Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto.
“Everything went well. There were no issues, no one was rude to me,” Brison said.
Brison is one of several women who reached out to CTVNews.ca to share their experiences on getting an abortion in Canada. But according to Meghan Doherty, director of global policy and advocacy at Action Canada for Sexual Health and Rights, access to abortion is not as simple for all Canadians as it was for Brison, even today, even though the procedure is legal.
“I don’t think it’s a uniform experience across Canada,” Doherty told CTVNews.ca Wednesday in a phone interview.
GEOGRAPHICAL BARRIERS IN RURAL AREAS
In 2016, a report by the United Nations Human Rights Commissioners highlighted a about lack of access to abortion and related services in Canada. Action Canada for Sexual Health and Rights has a free and confidential phone and text line which receives an average of 250 to 400 calls each month from those seeking information on abortion and other reproductive health services. A top concern among callers is the lack of abortion providers in their community, particularly among those who live in rural areas, Doherty said.
“We see a lot of small hospitals in these areas struggling with staffing and the types of services they can offer,” Doherty said. “That is also reflected in the availability of abortion services.”
For some people, this means traveling to other parts of the country to have an abortion, said Jill Doctoroff, executive director of the National Abortion Federation of Canada. This can lead to complex travel arrangements that could involve obtaining child care services if the person already has children, or taking time off work, she said.
In the rural areas of the country [with] communities that don’t have bus or train services and their closest option for abortion care is in the next town over, which could be an hour away,” she said. “For people who have limited resources… figuring out how to pay for that can be very difficult.”
Ariane Lachance had an abortion earlier this year. Fortunately, she said, she was able to have the procedure done at a women’s health clinic a short drive from where she lives in Montreal.
Without the financial means to care for a child or the support of a partner, the 24-year-old said she burst into tears when she found out she was pregnant.
“The only option was to have an abortion,” Lachance told CTVNews.ca in a telephone interview on Wednesday.
After searching for clinics online and talking to others who had previously had an abortion, she made an appointment. Within a week, Lachance underwent the procedure.
“I can’t even imagine the struggle these people have to go through, whether it’s traveling out of state or out of the country to get access,” he said.
RACIAL BARRIERS TO ACCESS
Since the introduction of medical abortion in 2017, which involves taking medication to induce an abortion, the procedure has become easier to access for those living in remote communities, Doctoroff said. However, medical abortions can only be prescribed for those who have been pregnant for less than 10 weeks.
Beyond those early stages, surgical intervention is required, and most of those services are provided in urban centers, Doherty said.
Those who require an abortion later in their pregnancy term face additional barriers to accessing services, Doctoroff said. In provinces like Nova Scotia, surgical abortions are not performed after more than 16 weeks pregnant, for instance. This may require people to travel to other parts of the country for the procedure. According to a published study by Action Canada for Sexual Health and Rights in 2019, no providers offer abortion services to Canadians who are more than 23 weeks and six days pregnant. Those who are so far along in their pregnancy and seek an abortion often travel to the United States for the procedure.
Another group that often struggles to access abortion services is immigrants, Doherty said. Those without proper documentation may have difficulty getting an abortion, as they may not have health insurance to cover related costs.
Much of the systemic racism that exists in Canadian institutions also affects those seeking to access abortion services in Canada, he said. This can lead to discrimination against racialized communities, such as those who are black, indigenous or of color, in seeking abortion services. The forced sterilization of indigenous women that continues today is an example of the “racist treatment” that racialized communities face in hospitals, Doherty said.
“Looking at health disparities across the country, we can see that people who are more likely to experience discrimination on a variety of grounds, including race, are more likely to experience barriers to accessing all kinds of health care services. health, including abortion, Doherty said.
SCRUTINY AND SHAME AROUND ABORTION
Despite its decriminalization in Canada in 1988, the stigma around abortion remains, Doherty said.
“We live in a patriarchal society with particular gender norms and anything related to sexuality and gender that goes beyond that very narrow framework is often subject to scrutiny, and with that comes stigma,” she said.
The more people talk about abortion and work to ensure it’s available to everyone in Canada, the easier it will be to normalize it as a common procedure and break the stigma, Doherty said.
For Jenn Howson, who lives in Calgary, the abortion process in 2018 was relatively straightforward, she said. At 38, Howson unexpectedly became pregnant. She and her husband already had a child together and were not in the financial position to have another, she said.
“Then, [abortion] it was an option… that was available to me and I had to make decisions,” Howson told CTVNews.ca in a telephone interview on Wednesday. “If we tie it to things that happen south of the border, they don’t have that option.”
After calling to make the appointment, Howson said she had a surgical abortion within a couple of weeks during her first trimester at a nearby hospital.
“I did a quick Google search, found the phone number to call [and] called them,” Howson said, describing the process for booking an appointment. “It was quick and easy… that’s how it should be when it comes to anything for our health.”
Despite the relatively easy process, Howson said she faced mental barriers related to the stigma of having an abortion, fearing others might think of her for having the procedure.
In addition to her 2018 abortion, Howson previously underwent a D&C procedure in 2011. Howson underwent the procedure, which is considered an early abortion method, after suffering a miscarriage.
“Abortions are also performed because they are medically necessary,” he said. “We shouldn’t be ashamed of having these kinds of procedures.”
By sharing her story, Howson hopes to contribute to a conversation where people realize that it’s okay to talk openly about abortion. Part of the solution also lies in health care providers being more vocal about the abortion services they provide, said Dr. Sarah Munro, an assistant professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of British Columbia.
While most people may think they need to go to a clinic to have an abortion, medical abortions in particular are accessible through primary health care providers, she said.
“It can be challenging, due to internalized stigma, for a client to ask their primary care provider about abortion options,” Munro told CTVNews.ca in a phone interview Wednesday. “In turn, it can be challenging for primary care providers to announce to their clients that this is part of [their] practice.
“The stigma goes both ways.”
Along with increased awareness of abortion services, Action Canada for Sexual Health and Rights is also calling on the federal government to provide more funding for clinics to meet demand, a struggle health centers in Ontario and Alberta continue to face. Doherty said.
Archived by Rhythm Sachdeva of CTVNews.ca and The Canadian Press