The issue of abortion has been turning into a heated social controversy in the wake of an announcement Wednesday by ProLife, an organization of obstetricians, charging certain hospitals with performing abortion procedures, which are illegal in South Korea. ProLife has been publicizing plans to wage a campaign to eradicate abortion based on the current law banning the procedure, while women’s groups are countering that a punishment-centered approach ignoring the social conditions that compel women to have abortions could generate serious social problems.
The primary reason for the eruption of this controversy over abortion is the disconnect between law and reality. In South Korea, abortion is illegal, and both the women who have abortions and the doctors who assist them are subject to punishment according to the penal code. Abortion is only permitted under five exceptional circumstances, including genetic defects or diseases in the woman or her spouse as specified by the Mother and Child Health Act, as well as pregnancies resulting from rape.
The reality, however, is such that the Ministry for Health, Welfare and Family Affairs has even acknowledged that over 95 percent of the approximately 350 thousand abortions performed each year were illegal. The average rate of abortions per year is 30 for every 1,000 women of childbearing age, higher than in countries like the U.S. (21) and Great Britain (18) where abortion enjoy broader legal recognition than in South Korea.
The principal reason the situation has arrived at this point is the irresponsibility of successive presidential administrations. So far, the government has abetted illegality by reducing the law to a dead letter, without making any efforts to change it to suit the reality. At the same time, it has provided neither proper sex education to young people nor the proper socioeconomic conditions for giving birth to and raising children. This has resulted in a climate in which human life is viewed lightly, and an environment in which some obstetricians regard abortions as a main source of income.
Clearly, there must be changes to this situation where abortions are performed all too easily in an unregulated system. However, the method of suddenly enforcing a dead letter law is exceedingly dangerous, as it could give rise to even more serious social problems such as women’s health issues. This is why abortion is both an ethical issue and a complex social issue.
Now that the topic has become the subject of public discussion, the government needs to take this opportunity to gather opinions from all areas of society and fully revise the law to suit the reality. It also needs to make plans for improving the socioeconomic environment that has led to illegal abortions. That said, it is not desirable for the abortion debate to turn into “pro-life” vs. “pro-choice” as in Western countries. Women’s lives must be respected as much the lives of fetuses. One point of reference may be the examples set by countries that have gone through lengthy periods of debate and managed to create laws a majority could agree upon.
Please direct questions or comments to [englishhani@hani.co.kr]
