Abortion in Ghana
I feel I need to say something about this topic. I know that most of my friends in Ghana will be unhappy with me for saying it. Yet I think it needs to be said. I think as Ghanaians, we need to rid our hearts and heads of the hypocrisy that infects us deeply. I will pick one single issue to illustrate this. “THE ISSUE OF ABORTION”. As Ghanaians, we all (myself included) stigmatize and disrespect women and girls who undertake abortions. I’m on my way to cleanse my mind of such hypocrisy.
It is well a known and pervasive social condition in modern Ghana that majority (my assessment) of our young boys and girls engage in sexual intercourse. Yet we are quick to stigmatize girls who get pregnant and even worse those who abort. On the other hand, the boys enjoy even better social status/recognition and “fame” for, as they say “bedding” as many girls as possible. How can we develop as nation if we continue to discriminate against the majority of our population (women)? Sexuality is just one of such instances of discrimination. Legally, abortion is allowed in Ghana under a number of circumstances, yet, most health professionals and police stigmatize their colleagues who perform it.
Conditions
1.Rape or defilement (child)
2. Incest
3. Insane mother
4. Health conditions of the mother
5. Health conditions of the child (unborn)
All the above scenarios are legal only if the doctor and institution is government certified.
Doctors are sometimes called abortion doctors by their peers. Meanwhile, these same doctors sleep with (insisting on doing it without protection) as many nurses as possible even though they surely have no intention of marrying them. Most of us oppose abortion, yet, we discriminate against children born outside marriage. Most of us oppose abortion, yet a child born without a leg or an arm or an eye is discriminated against in Ghana. Still we discriminate against abortion or teen pregnancies yet most of us engage in premarital sex. It is simply hypocrisy.
Personally, I have not sleep with anybody I haven’t married but I feel I should not judge, discriminate or stigmatize someone because s/he has had sex, had a baby or aborted out of wedlock. Many girls die or suffer serious physical & sexual health problems because they did not know that abortion was legal in Ghana and that they have the right to seek it under the above conditions. They therefore resort to taking unsafe measures and ens up being abused by unscrupulous quack doctors; we all can remember the recent sex pervert doctor in Madina, a suburb of Accra. Many still die because some health professionals refuse to do for them what is their right, simply because they(the professional) is morally against abortion, forgetting that they have a duty to all patients in Ghana. Ironically, they sleep with young girls all the time.
For defilement, rape, incest, insane mother, health conditions, I cannot oppose abortion in such instances. A girl raped or defiled must have the right and support to chart the path she wants. Neither society, religion nor law should restrict the choice of such a so awfully wronged person. And simply, how do I abrogate to myself the role of regulating how people should treat their bodies?
