Current abortion law in Nepal leading to unsafe practices

KATHMANDU, June 17: Although Nepal's Constitution and international women's rights movements guarantee the right to safe abortion, experts have pointed out that the recent Safe Abortion Act has narrowed this right, effectively criminalizing both service seekers and providers.

This concern was raised by presenters during a recently held dialogue on reproductive rights.

The Safe Motherhood and Reproductive Health Rights Act, 2018, allows women to terminate a pregnancy within 12 weeks by choice, and up to 28 weeks if the pregnancy poses a risk to the woman's life, if the fetus has a disability, or in cases of HIV, incest, or rape.

However, experts argue that despite these provisions, the law has effectively criminalized the right to abortion. Pushpa Joshi, a member of YoSHAN, stated that the existing legal framework automatically leads to criminalization. As a result, instead of accessing safe abortion services, many women are forced into unsafe abortions, she said.

According to Joshi, many women are compelled to seek abortion after 13 weeks due to several reasons — including lack of awareness about their abortion rights, inability to identify proper health facilities, irregular menstruation, and uncertainty in determining the duration of pregnancy. However, the current law restricts abortion beyond 12 weeks solely based on a woman’s choice, denying her the right to terminate the pregnancy after that period unless specific conditions are met.

Similarly, Joshi said that some women may face health complications even after 28 weeks of pregnancy, or the fetus may develop serious health issues, or there may be personal reasons that necessitate an abortion. However, the legal provisions severely restrict abortion beyond 28 weeks, even under such circumstances. Since the law does not permit abortion after the prescribed time frame by a woman's choice, many women are forced to seek secret and unsafe services from unregulated health providers.

“Some women even buy abortion pills and use them at home, which have led to excessive bleeding and, in some cases, death,” Joshi stated.

She further stated that restricting abortion outside the legally defined timeframes suppresses a woman’s right to make decisions about her own body. As a result, many women become victims of unsafe abortions, which has led to a significant number of maternal deaths in Nepal.

According to data published in 2021, unsafe abortions still account for 7 percent of total maternal deaths in the country. Similarly, data from the Guttmacher Institute of Reproductive Health published in 2022 shows that 5 percent of maternal deaths in Nepal are caused by unsafe abortions.

Joshi emphasized that the right to abortion is a fundamental human right and a matter of bodily autonomy for women. She criticized the government for failing to ensure appropriate legal provisions, despite repeated recommendations from international bodies.

According to her, the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) in 2021 had recommended that the Nepalese government decriminalize abortion. Similarly, the CEDAW Committee—which monitors the implementation of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women—had also urged Nepal to decriminalize abortion.

She expressed concern that, despite these recommendations and constitutional guarantees, treating abortion as a criminal act violates women’s rights and undermines the principle of “My body, my choice.”

Despite continuous advocacy by several organizations such as the Forum for Women, Law and Development (FWLD), Ipas Nepal, Nepal Development Research Institute (NDRI) and YoSHAN, for women’s reproductive rights and access to safe abortion, no significant legal reforms have been achieved so far, said Pushpa Joshi.

Sabin Shrestha, Executive Director of the FWLD and a legal advocate working on this issue, stated that the current abortion law imposes restrictions on women's right to life. According to Shrestha, the existing law stipulates a five-year prison sentence for abortions conducted after 28 weeks, and this clause must be removed to ensure decriminalization of abortion.

According to Shrestha, the Forum has already submitted a draft proposal to the Ministry of Health and Population and they have been informed that the ministry is currently collecting feedback from various other ministries. “However, there is still a delay in registering the proposal as a bill in Parliament,” he said.