Public funding of abortions is one topic on the minds of Halton Pro-Life members and supporters going to Ottawa for the March for Life this week (another being a bill to protect women from coercion to abort - see separate report).

• Pro-lifers are being urged to support Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s plan to exclude funding of abortion from foreign aid.
• At the same time, Ontarians are paying for abortions at home through taxes to the tune of $30 million.

Canada’s plan for maternal health

As has been well reported in the media, Prime Minister Stephen Harper is adamant that Canadian funds devoted to women’s health in the developing world will not pay for abortions. At the upcoming G8 and G20 conferences in Huntsville and Toronto, ON, in June, he will push other nations to support his proposal to fund women’s health initiatives in poor regions of the world.

Kathy Matusiac, Executive Director of The deVeber Institute has emailed pro-lifers to say that “After just speaking to both the Prime Minister and Hon. Bev Oda’s office (Minister of International Cooperation), I urge you as individuals to contact them and applaud them in their resolve to not bring abortion to other countries as a form of foreign aid. They have not received any positive response for their position. They are however, receiving intense pressure from the public, media and various government officials to fund abortion in developing nations. Please take a moment to tell them otherwise.”

Maternal mortality and abortion

Kathy Matusiac goes on to say:

“The opposition is convinced that abortion is the key to improved social and economic status for women, however recent reports from both the World Health Organization (WHO) and World Economic Forum reveal very different stories. Each report provides statistical evidence to show that countries with more restrictive abortion laws (e. g., Ireland and Poland) have lower maternal mortality rates than countries with permissive abortion laws (e. g. the U.S.).”

Ian Gentles, de Veber Institute Director of Research, has covered much of this in newspaper columns. In recent Calgary Herald column he wrote:

“Poland, for example, banned abortion 20 years ago. Despite being a poor country, it has since succeeded in greatly improving the health of both its women and children. Maternal mortality has plunged by more than 40 per cent, infant mortality by 25 per cent, and the extreme preterm (meaning under 28 weeks gestation) birth rate has dropped by over 20 per cent.”

People can contact the Prime Minister and the Minister of International Cooperation at:

Opposition to Mr. Harper’s plan to exclude abortion from foreign-aid funding has come from U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and from the Liberal Party of Canada. It should be noted, however, that a number of Liberal MPs broke ranks and either abstained or voted against a Liberal Party motion urging the government to include abortion funding.

Public funding of abortions in Ontario

At home in Canada, public funding of abortions is governed by the provinces. In Ontario, all abortions are paid for through taxes, even though a significant majority (approximately two-thirds) of tax payers object to this. Abortion costs the Ontario health system $30 million per year in the cost of the procedure alone, not considering the costs of the effects of women’s health of abortion.

For a full report, see the article: Taxpayers Are Funding Abortions Against Their Wishes