The question of abortion is lost before the election in Poland
The issue of abortion has been almost completely invisible during Poland’s presidential campaign. This is because none of the candidates consider themselves to benefit from raising the issue. But it refuses the women in Abortion Dream Team to accept, their reception is located on Wiejskagatan near the Polish Parliament Sejmen.
And it also refuses the abortion opponents to agree. The deafening whistle from the Vuvuzelorna and recorded child screams is unbearably outside the gates. The Antiabort activists block the entrance to the reception with noise and banners: « Here children are murdered ».
Inside the room is a cutting line Natalia Broniaczyk from Abortion Dream Team. It is not just the screaming of the activists who worry. She has also been subjected to murder threats from the unforgiving abortion opponents who are close to the right -wing nationalist movement. She has received text messages like « I know where you go out with the dog ».
– You have called my mother and said that I am dead. I didn’t think I would experience in Democratic Poland. It’s hard, but I have to think about the women.
Natalia broniaczyk does not hide its Disappointment at the liberal politicians as a broad coalition of women and younger people helped power in the parliamentary elections in the fall of 2023. A clear majority of the Poles support the proposal with free abortion for the twelfth pregnancy week.
– No one talks about it in the presidential campaign. I can understand that, and people bite. But the women can’t wait, now they need help. So our reception is both a political protest and help to the needy women.
How can there be a reception that makes it easier for women to take abortion pills when abortion is in principle prohibited?
The answer is that the Polish prohibition of abortion differs from other countries in an important respect: here it is not a crime for the woman to interrupt a pregnancy, nor to possess or muddy abortion pills. However, it is punishable to assist a woman to perform an abortion or provide her with drugs that interrupt the pregnancy.
So the reception in the middle of Warsaw Have a difficult balance when they meet women who want to have an abortion. During our visit to the reception, a woman is in one of the reception’s inner rooms to carry out what is called a medical abortion; She has taken tablets that evoke a break in pregnancy.
– It is one of 130 abortions that we help with daily, most remotely, via link. There are about half of all abortions conducted by Polish women. The others usually do this by traveling to the Czech Republic and Slovakia, says Natalia Broniaczyk.
When the liberal coalition won the parliamentary elections in October 2023, many of the women and young people who were mobilized hoped to vote for a change that there would soon be relief in Poland’s rigid abortion legislation.
One of Donald Tusk’s election promises was to liberalize the abortion law if he defeated the national conservative government that has ruled in Poland for eight years.
But nothing has happened after Tusk has been a prime minister for a year and a half. He has explained that there is no parliamentary majority to liberalize the abortion law. There is not even a consensus on the issue within the coalition government.
So abortions are still almost completely banned. The only exception is whether the woman’s life is in danger or if the pregnancy is a result of incest or rape. For a few years now, it is not allowed to interrupt the pregnancy if the fetus has incurable injuries.
Thus, it is no major comfort that liberal presidential candidate Rafal Trzaskowski has promised to write on a law that legalizes abortion if he is elected.
– The promises of politicians have proven to be empty. That was a reason why two months ago we opened this abortion reception, says Justyna Wydrzynska, one of the initiators of the Abortion Dream Team. She has been active in the issue of abortion for almost 20 years.
Together with Natalia Broniaczyk and the others in the team, they chose, somewhat provocatively, to place the reception abotak close to Poland’s center of power – a hundred meters from the Sejmen, the Polish Parliament.
– What we are mainly looking for is to create a physically safe place for women to go if they need help, not to change the law.
Justyna Wydrzynska don’t believe that The result in the presidential election will have a crucial importance in the issue of abortion.
– It is said that if only the « right » president is elected, that is, Rafal Trzaskowski, then it will secure the rights of abortion. But I don’t believe that. Instead, we have invested in opening our reception next to the sail, to show the prohibitions that we exist.
She emphasizes that the most important thing is to decriminalize abortion aid to women. Since 2020, when the Constitutional Court introduced the latest legislative, six Polish women have died because doctors – probably for fear of being prosecuted – have not performed their legal duty to perform abortion.
Abotak is not called a clinic, as there are no doctors in place. Patients administer the abortion pills themselves. Here, women can take the tablets and stay for six to eight hours before the fetus is bumped out.
Justyna Wydrzynska believes that women themselves should be able to buy the tablets at a Polish pharmacy. Now they are referred to order them from abroad.
Two years ago became Justyna Wydrzynska The first person convicted of providing a woman with abortion pills.
The woman had heard in February 2020, during the pandemic. She had a hard time getting hold of abortion pills, and Justyna Wydrzynska helped her with it. But when the woman’s partner was told, he called the police. The name of Justin was listed on the packaging in which the tablets were sent. The police did the house search her, and then she was charged with « help for abortions ».
The penalty was eight months of community service, a relatively mild sanction. The maximum penalty for the crime is three years in prison.
The woman who interrupted her pregnancy, on the other hand, was free, due to the design of the Polish abortion ban.
Justyna Wydrzynska appealed against the verdict, and the case was sent back to the lower instance. But a decisive can take a long time, making her angry and frustrated.
– I hope, of course, for free judgment, but time just goes and you never know. In the worst case, the lawyers say, it may take several years before the case is taken up in a higher court.
She has received some encouragement of A large name gathering under the motto « Justyna is innocent » with hundreds of thousands of signatures that have been sent to Polish Justice Minister Adam Bodnar.
During the communist era, until the beginning of the 1990s, Poland had in principle free abortion. But in the new Democratic Poland, in 1993, under strong pressure from the Catholic Church, a law with the nearest total ban on abortions. Or, more specifically, prohibition on « assistance to abortions ».
– Then no one knew that abortion pills would appear. In my case, I provided a woman with the pills, and I was convicted of that. But it was not me who performed the abortion, but herself, which is not forbidden.
Outside the reception, half a dozen activists are still blocking the entrance. At a little distance stands a police patrol and monitors the action. One of the police officers has explained on my question that they have permission.
– That’s exactly what feels like a betrayal. The state lets them be held and the police do nothing to be harassed, says Natalia Broniaczyk.
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