mid-day editorial: Women, don't abort your right to safety

There is a reason why the law dictates that Medical Termination of Pregnancy (MTP) can only be performed on the advice of medical experts - a botched abortion can end up costing the patient's life

There is a reason why the law dictates that Medical Termination of Pregnancy (MTP) can only be performed on the advice of medical experts - a botched abortion can end up costing the patient's life. But as a front-page report in this paper highlighted, desperate women are now resorting to abortions at the click of a button, illegally ordering pills from shady online stores that don't ask for a prescription.

Many are single or underage, and are petrified of the social stigma from a pregnancy out of wedlock. Desperate to keep it a secret, these patients avoid consulting a doctor and, so, never learn of the dangers of an abortion gone wrong.

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Selling abortion pills without prescription and age proof is illegal under the Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act (MTPA). While the Maharashtra Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has shut down many portals, within minutes, new websites are set up.

Now, it is up to the individuals to wise up to the danger of an unsupervised abortion, and desist ordering such pills online. Girls should realise that their parents' reprimands are nothing in comparison to risking their life, which is what they are doing by consuming abortion pills on the sly. Families, too, can watch out for certain red flags - unexplained packets, unusual behaviour, or missing money. Some of these pills are pricey, so if money has disappeared of late, or your daughter has been borrowing money under one pretext or another, it may be time to gently ask her why, and use every skill to get the correct answer from her.

Non-profits working in the health space and the government could start a campaign to alert young people to the dangers of these pills. Lawmakers, NGOs, counsellors, family doctors must all work together to combat this threat.

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