Pro-life, even in death

Irish voters face a referendum that would prohibit abortion even when suicide is a health risk for the mother.

By Quentin Fottrell

Mar 1, 2002 | Despite strict antiabortion legislation and constitutional protection of "the unborn child," Ireland grapples almost constantly with the issue of abortion rights. Voters failed to pass referenda in 1983 and 1992 that might have paved the way for legal abortion; at the same time, at least 6,500 women still travel from Ireland to Britain every year to legally terminate their pregnancies. Almost 100,000 have made the trip since abortion was legalized in Britain in 1967.

Next week, Irish voters will decide the fate of a new bill designed to reverse a change in the law that allows doctors to terminate a pregnancy where there is "a real and substantial risk" to the mother's health. The referendum marks the 10th anniversary of the so-called "X case," in which a 14-year-old victim of sexual abuse was barred from traveling to Britain for an abortion, but was subsequently allowed to go after the country's highest court ruled that she was suicidal and therefore at risk. The case led to a decision to allow abortion on Irish soil in the event that suicide -- and therefore a threat to the mother's life -- appeared likely. The measure on the ballot next week would reverse this decision, removing suicide as a health risk and legal basis for abortion.

Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern, leader of the center-right Fianna Fail party, had promised antiabortion activists, as well as the Catholic Church, that he would offer a referendum on the suicide exclusion as soon as possible, and, in the apparent hope of distracting voters from the failing "Celtic Tiger" economy, he pushed to have a vote before spring. Unfortunately, confusion and anger about the referendum have replaced financial angst, and much distraction comes from the retelling of stories about pregnant teenagers whose heartbreaking cases many believe have stigmatized Ireland, as well as shamed its citizens.

The case of Anne Lovett, a 15-year-old pregnant schoolgirl, perhaps deserves the most attention, though it happened in 1984. Lovett was found dead in a grotto of the Virgin Mary in the tiny village of Granard, County Longford. She was in labor, but hadn't told anyone she was pregnant. According to the postmortem, she died of exposure and hemorrhage after lying for four hours in the wind and rain.

It took two weeks for the story to reach the national press and even then local papers were reluctant to cover it. Those close to Lovett claimed ignorance of her pregnancy and insisted they'd have helped had they known. An inquest revealed that people did know, but thought it was none of their business.

Lovett's case is particularly relevant as Irish voters go to the polls: The frightened teenager essentially killed herself instead of getting an abortion, proving that a pregnant woman can indeed be suicidal, if only for lack of alternatives to pregnancy in Ireland. The tragedy also shows that the suicide of a pregnant woman can bring a horrific end to the life of the child.

In light of Lovett's death and the "X case," the proposal to exclude suicide as a threat to a woman's health appears more than a little draconian to some; then again, church influence in Irish government is so strong that suicide was not decriminalized until 1993. (Ireland was the last European country to decriminalize it, and still has one of the highest rates of suicide in Europe.)

Increasingly, there is a sense of outrage inside Ireland, which now has the youngest population in the Europe. A new generation of citizens has demonstrated growing religious skepticism, largely due to sex scandals that have rocked the Catholic Church since the 1990s. It is not the same place it was 30 years ago, when single mothers frequently were whisked away to work in industrial laundries and forced to give up their children.

But the rebellion of those who would defy the church over abortion has mostly been expressed indirectly. Rather than openly challenge the abortion ban by breaking the law, those who favor choice voice their opinions but ultimately terminate their pregnancies outside the country. This practice has been dubbed "an Irish solution to an Irish problem," and sustained by a referendum that gave Irish women the right to travel to obtain abortions, and another that made information on how to obtain an abortion overseas available to all. But the "out of sight, out of mind" approach has been less and less effective as cases like that of the 14-year-old abuse victim draw the attention of voters and lawmakers, as well as the outside world.

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