Topics / Life, death and morality
Should abortion be legal, and on what terms?
People disagree about whether, and on what terms, the law should permit abortion. The disagreement turns mainly on how to weigh the moral status of the embryo and foetus against the bodily autonomy, health and circumstances of the pregnant woman. Facts about foetal development, the timing of abortions and health outcomes inform the debate but do not settle it.
Positions
- Legal on request throughout pregnancy, decided by the woman and her doctor: Whether to continue a pregnancy is a decision for the pregnant woman, made with her doctor, at every stage, and the criminal law should not override that judgement. Abortions late in pregnancy are rare, and they typically arise in difficult circumstances that fixed legal limits handle badly.
- Legal with time limits: Abortion should be legally available on request in the earlier part of pregnancy, with stricter conditions later, because the moral claims of the foetus grow as it develops towards viability and the capacity to feel. A time limit, with exceptions for serious risk and severe anomaly, balances the woman's autonomy against that growing claim.
- Illegal except to save the mother's life: From conception, the unborn child is a living human being with the same right not to be intentionally killed as any other person. The law should therefore prohibit abortion, while always permitting the treatment needed to save the mother's life.
- Illegal with exceptions for rape, incest and fatal anomalies: Unborn human life deserves legal protection, so abortion should generally be prohibited. The law should still allow exceptions where the mother's life is at risk, where the pregnancy results from rape or incest, and where the foetus has a fatal condition, because in those circumstances requiring the pregnancy to continue asks too much or protects no life that could be lived.