Germany missing window to legalize abortion amid rush to elections

Despite promising an overhaul of Germany's dated legislation on abortion, the outgoing government looks set to miss the opportunity as the country rushes towards an early election, reported dpa.

Some now fear that the law could become less, not more liberal.

Silence, stigma, shame, high costs and an odyssey of legal conditions await women seeking to end their pregnancy in Germany.

Abortion is illegal here and exempt from punishment only under specific conditions, making it among the stricter regimes in Europe.

"Germany sees itself as a champion of human rights but when you actually look at the situation in certain areas, in terms of reproductive rights, it does not match up to this self-image," says Amnesty International Germany gender justice expert Katharina Masoud.

Women may terminate their pregnancies within the first 12 weeks and avoid legal consequences only if they undergo mandatory counselling and a required waiting period.

The other main exemptions are if the pregnancy puts the mother's life in danger, or in cases where the pregnancy is the result of rape.

The outgoing coalition government vowed to overhaul the abortion ban - which goes back over 150 years to when it was first written into Germany's penal code - right at the start of its term in 2021, but failed to do so.

While there might have been time to change the law by September - the original date planned for the next election - the snap poll called for February 23 has all but put paid to activists' hopes for change.

Government slow to act

The first steps by Chancellor Olaf Scholz's centre-left coalition to fulfil their campaign promise were not taken until 2023, with the establishment of an expert commission to examine the extent to which abortions could be regulated outside of the penal code.

The commission recommended legalizing terminations during the first 12 weeks of pregnancy.

Women would still be obliged to undergo counselling but would not have to wait three days between counselling and the procedure as is currently mandatory.

The commission also proposed if an abortion is carried out without a counselling certificate, only the doctor - not the woman - should be liable to prosecution.

Months passed and finally, frustrated civil society groups took the rare step of commissioning their own lawyers to draft a law based on the experts' suggestions.

Lawmakers later produced a similar draft, but by then it was already late 2024.

The draft is slated to be debated by parliament's legal affairs committee on February 10, the day before the end of the parliamentary period.

Activists say that although there is a majority in parliament for reform, it will be virtually impossible to pass the legislation in this time frame.

Need for change?

Speeding up the legislative process would require a consensus among all parties, but this is unlikely as some parties do not support changing the law, let alone making the decision-making process faster.

The centre-right opposition slammed the government for the "scandalous" move to introduce the draft law so close to an election. There was no urgency to provoke "a completely unnecessary further major socio-political conflict," said Christian Democrat leader Friedrich Merz in December.

Some lawmakers oppose reform saying women already have access to abortion in Germany.

In the decade up until 2023, about 100,000 abortions have been registered in official statistics each year, one of the lowest in Europe.

Activists see the argument as deeply flawed.

"Many people in Germany do not realize it is still a criminal offence," says Amnesty's Masoud.

"They assume that it is not forbidden because it is possible," she says. "They only find out later, once they need one and have to undergo the odyssey of fulfilling all the criteria."

Apart from the legal conditions, finding a doctor willing to perform the procedure has not been not easy. Until a change of law in mid-2022, it was illegal for doctors to even share information about providing abortion procedures.

On top of that, women in rural areas often have to travel long distances, incurring additional costs above paying for the procedure itself - as health insurers do not cover it.

"Criminalizing abortion creates a climate where it is not talked about – people suffer from guilt if they have one," Masoud says. "Legalizing abortion would break through the stigma."

The obligatory counselling "can mean women feel they are not trusted to make the decision by themselves," says Stephanie Schlitt of Pro Familia, a nationwide family planning organization.

It is one of dozens of human rights groups, along with the World Health Organization, which have been calling on Berlin for years to overhaul the law.

Germany remains an outlier compared to many Western democracies.

Neighbour France last year anchored women's right to an abortion in its constitution.

Despite a strong Catholic tradition - and the personal opposition of its current prime minister, Giorgia Meloni - it is legal in Italy to have an abortion in the first three months of pregnancy.

Even Spain, and farther afield Mexico and Argentina have introduced more liberal regulations in recent years.

Poland, the only country of a comparable size in Europe, has been among the very few worldwide to introduce more restrictive policy.

Fight for reform set to continue

It is unclear how the German government will look after the February 23 vote, but the opinion polls do not paint a welcome picture for abortion activists.

Forecasts show the conservative Christian Democrats with about 30% and far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) with about 20%, meaning the conservative and anti-abortion camp is likely to grow stronger, says Daniela Trochowski, who heads the leftist Rosa-Luxemburg foundation.

The AfD has proposed restricting reproductive rights further.

"Opponents of a change in the law are gaining momentum due to the re-election of Donald Trump as US president, who also takes a strongly anti-abortion stance," says Trochowski.

According to Masoud, the political swing to the right stands in contrast however to the views of the wider population, with polls showing some 80% would support at least partial legalization. "Lawmakers should respect that," she argues.

"The issue will not go away," says Schlitt, looking beyond February.

"If lawmakers do not address it now, the problems will grow, as will public awareness of the issue," she says, vowing to fight on for change.