Abortion in Russia

Abortion in Russia is currently legal up to the 12th week of pregnancy. In 1920, Russia became the first country in the world to allow abortion in all circumstances, but, over the course of the 20th century, the legality of abortion changed more than once, with a ban being enacted again from 1936 to 1954. Russia had the highest number of abortions per woman of child-bearing age in the world according to UN data of 2004. However, in terms of the total number, in 2009 China reported that it had over 13 million abortions, far surpassing the 1.2 million abortions Russia had, and India had an estimated 11 million, although accurate data was difficult to obtain.

Abortion in the Russian Empire

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Abortion was illegal in the Russian Empire.

Abortion in the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic

1920-1936

In October 1920 the Bolsheviks made abortion legal with their “Decree on Women’s Healthcare.” The government saw this as a temporary necessity, as after the economic crisis and nearly a decade of unrest, war, revolution, and civil war, many women would be seeking abortions due to not being able to take care of their child. The Soviet officials believed in the Utopian socialist future abortion would become unnecessary. Soviet officials argued that women would be getting abortions regardless of legality, and the state would be able to regulate and control abortion only if it was legalized. 

The Soviet Union became the first country to have abortion available, on request, often for no cost . There was intense debate among government and medical officials surrounding its legalization. The main arguments used in opposition to legalizing abortion were that it would have a harmful effect on population growth or on the grounds that it was too medically harmful to the woman.

1936-1955

In 1936 the Soviet Union made abortion illegal again, stemming largely from Joseph Stalin’s worries about population growth. The law that outlawed abortion did not only do just that, but rather contained several different decrees. The official title of the law was, “Decree on the Prohibition of Abortions, the Improvement of Material Aid to Women in Childbirth, the Establishment of State Assistance to Parents of Large Families, and the Extension of the Network of Lying-in Homes, Nursery schools and Kindergartens, the Tightening-up of Criminal Punishment for the Non-payment of Alimony, and on Certain Modifications in Divorce Legislation.” All of this was part of Stalin’s initiative to encourage population growth, as well as place a stronger emphasis on the importance of the family unit to communism.

The law provided allowances to women for their seventh and subsequent children up until their third birthday. In 1944 the benefits were expanded to offer allowances for the third children until their fourth birthday and for fourth and subsequent children until their seventh birthday. However, all of this aid was cut in 1948, after the largest source of population depletions, World War II, was over. Despite abortion being outlawed and these fertility policies, abortion rates remained high during this time. Illegal abortions caused an estimated 4,000 deaths per year from complications from underground abortions. Women continued to get illegal abortions during this time due to policies encouraging married women to be employed and very little of national income being spent on housing.

During the postwar era, millions of men were dead and the government was forced to legitimize single-mother families. The New Family Law of 1944 sanctioned single motherhood as a site of reproduction by providing financial support for single mothers. The prevalence of single mothers in this time was a reality; by 1957, 3.2 women were claiming government aid as single mothers.

1955 onward

After the Stalin’s death in 1953, abortion was relegalized in 1955. The decree stated that “measures carried out by the Soviet state to encourage motherhood and protect infancy, as well as the uninterrupted growth of the consciousness and culturedness of women,” allowed for the change in policy. The language of the decree implied that most women would choose motherhood over abortion and that preventing abortion remained a goal of the government, as it was still encouraging population growth.

During the late 1950s and 1960s, it is estimated that the Soviet Union had some of the highest abortion rates in the world. We do not know the abortion rate during this period for sure, because the Soviet Union did not start releasing abortion statistics until perestroika. Our best estimates, which are based on surveys of medical professionals during this time, say that about 6 to 7 million abortion were performed per year.

One of the few insights we have regarding abortion during the late 1950s is a survey, conducted between 1958 and 1959, of 26,000 women seeking abortions, 20,000 from urban areas and 6,000 from rural areas. Several interesting facts can be gathered from this survey regarding what kind of women sought abortions and their reasons for doing so. First of all, an “overwhelming majority” of the women were married, though the survey results do not give an exact percentage. Second, we can learn how many children the women had. Of the urban women, 10.2% were childless, 41.2% had one child, 32.1% had two children, and 16.5% had three or more children, making the median number of children 1.47. Of the rural women 6.2% were childless, 26.9% had one child, 30% had two children, and 36.9% had three or more children, the median number of children being 2.06. Of women seeking abortions, urban women were more likely to have fewer or no children. This may have been an effect of the lack of space faced by urban women.

The survey also examined women’s reasons for seeking abortions. It divided the reasons into four categories. The first was “unconditionally removable”, things that could be remedied by government action, such as material need, lack of space, no one at home, or no institution to put child in. The second category was “conditionally removable”, things that might possibly be remedied by government action, such as the absence of husband, family troubles, or illness of one of both parents. The third category was “unremovable”, things that were not caused by social conditions, such as a baby in family or many children already. The fourth category was “unclear causes”, such as one or both parents unwilling to have a child and other or multiple reasons.

The results for this question were: of the reasons given by urban women, 35% were unconditionally removable, 16.5%, were conditionally removable, 10% were unremovable, and 37.9% were unclear. Of the reasons given by rural women, 26.3% were unconditionally removable, 18% were conditionally removable, 10% were unremovable, and 45.2% were unclear. The most marked different was that more urban women cited lack of space as a reason. The survey results found that abortion rates were much higher among women who work, unsurprisingly, with a rate of 105.5 abortions per thousand pregnancies, as against 41.5 per thousand in women who did not work.

If the abortion rates of this survey are taken to be representative, then during this time period the number of annual abortions was higher than the number of live births. This would also mean that the abortion rates in the Soviet Union were the highest of any in the world at this time.

Current law

On 21 October 2011, the Russian Parliament passed a law restricting abortion to the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, with an exception up to 22 weeks if the pregnancy was the result of rape, and for medical necessity it can be performed at any point during pregnancy. The new law also made mandatory a waiting period of two to seven days before an abortion can be performed, to allow the woman to "reconsider her decision". Abortion can only be performed in licensed institutions (typically hospitals or women’s clinics) and by physicians who have specialized training. The physician can refuse to perform the abortion, except the abortions for medical necessity.

According to the Criminal Code of Russia (article 123), the performance of an abortion by a person who does not have a medical degree and specialized training is punishable by fine of up to 80 000 RUB; by a fine worth up to 6 months of the convicted's income; by community service from 100 to 240 hours; or by a jail term of 1 to 2 years. In cases when the illegal abortion resulted in the death of the pregnant woman, or caused significant harm to her health, the convicted faces a jail term of up to 5 years.

Recent efforts

The abortion issue has gained renewed attention in 2011 in a debate that the New York Times says "has begun to sound like the debate in the United States". Parliament passed and President Dmitri Medvedev signed several restrictions on abortion into law to combat "a falling birthrate" and "plunging population". The restrictions include requiring abortion providers to devote 10% of advertising costs to describing the dangers of abortion to a woman's health and make it illegal to describe abortion as a safe medical procedure. Medvedev's wife Svetlana Medvedeva has taken up the pro-life cause in Russia in a weeklong national campaign against abortion called "Give Me Life!" and a "Day of Family, Love and Faithfulness" by her Foundation for Social and Cultural Initiatives in conjunction with the Russian Orthodox Church.

Statistics

Despite a significant reduction in the abortion to birth ratio since the mid-1990s, the countries of the former Soviet Union maintain the highest rate of abortions in the world. In 2001, 1.31 million children were born in Russia, while 2.11 million abortions were performed. In 2005, 1.5 million abortions were registered in Russia; 20% of these involved young women under the age of majority. Official statistics put the number at 989,000 in 2011, though Russian pro-life activists say that number is much higher.

Abortion statistics were classified in the Soviet Union until the end of the 1980s. During this period, the USSR had one of the highest abortion rates in the world. The abortion rate in the USSR peaked in 1965, when 5.5 million abortions were performed, the highest number in Russia’s history. Nevertheless, the legalization of abortion did not fully eliminate criminal abortions. [E.A. Sadvokasova]

See also

• Russian cross

External links

• Tishchenko P., Yudin B. Moral Status of Fetuses in Russia