Women flood the streets. They fight to repeal outdated abortion laws
On Saturday 17 June, hundreds of women from England and Wales took to the streets. "Our bodies, our right to decide" - with such banners they marched through London. They demanded the repeal of outdated abortion laws.
Women from England and Wales are demanding a change to one of the most outdated laws on abortion. It dates back to Victorian times.
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Abortion - women on the streets of London
At the beginning of June a woman from England was sentenced to 28 months in prison because she used pills to terminate her pregnancy. She was sent to prison under a law from the Victorian era. This situation has started a public discussion about abortion laws.
"It’s just ridiculous that the state, the government, keeps just involving themselves like in birthing people’s rights to choose abortion," Nadia Hirsi, a 23-year-old actress and theatre maker from London who attended the protest in central London, told CNN.
"The liberalization of abortion law is under threat like never before," said Jenny Wickham, a 75-year-old pro-choice activist who has been regularly demonstrating since 1960s (!).
Abortion is currently legal in the UK up to the first 24 weeks of pregnancy. After this threshold, women found to have administered drugs to terminate it are liable to imprisonment up to a life term. The 44-year-old mother-of-three was handed a 28-month sentence by a judge at Stoke-on-Trent Crown Court in central England. It was handed down under the Offences Against the Person Act, which dates back to 1861, CNN reports.
Barrister Charlotte Proudman called the act itself "ancient" in an interview with CNN, stressing that it was " written at a time when women didn’t even have the right to vote " in the UK.
Source: CNN
