Press release for immediate release
Stop Gendercide calls for total ban on sex-selective abortion following investigation
Stop Gendercide is calling for the Government to introduce an explicit ban on sex-selective abortion following an investigation by the Victoria Derbyshire Show revealing that there is widespread evidence of women coming under intense pressure to undergo sex-selective abortions in the UK.
Labour this morning announced support for a ban on new early Non-Invasive Prenatal Testing being used to detect gender. Stop Gendercide have welcomed the move, but pointed out that this only provides a solution for part of this problem.
Testing later in pregnancy and testing overseas would provide a means to get around this ban and for the practice of sex-selective abortion to continue in the UK.
The British Medical Association (BMA) have outlined cases in which they believe sex-selective abortion to be permissible on mental health grounds. The British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS) which performs more than 60,000 abortions per year in the UK take still another view. In their literature, they claim that abortion for gender is not illegal.
Stop Gendercide have therefore identified that the banning of the tests must be accompanied by an explicit ban on sex-selective abortion.
An investigation by the Telegraph revealed that doctors were agreeing to provide sex-selective abortions ‘no questions asked’. There is widespread support for an explicit ban on sex-selective abortion, with recent polling by undertaken by ComRes showing that 89% of the general population and 91% of women agree that gender-selective abortion should be explicitly banned by the law.
Rani Bilku, spokesperson for Stop Gendercide and founder of Jeena International, said:
“While we welcome and support calls to ban these tests being used for identifying gender, this will only provide a solution for part of the problem. We are calling for this ban on tests to be accompanied by the Government introducing a total explicit ban on sex-selective abortion. Banning these early tests will not stop people finding out later in pregnancy that they are carrying a girl or having testing overseas and being provided with a sex-selective abortion here in the UK. To be effective the ban on these tests must be accompanied by an explicit ban on sex-selective abortion.”
ENDS
For interviews, contact https://stopgendercide.org/ spokeswomen Rani Bilkhu on 07958 603 541 or email info@stopgendercide.org
To find out more about the Stop Gendercide campaign visit www.stopgendercide.org
A feature video on the Stop Gendercide campaign including an interview with Rani Bilkhu is available here (The original video file is available on request): http://youtu.be/nJCMkb8R1Rw.
