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Journalism of Courage
Portugal’s Health Minister Dr Marta Temido resigned from office on Tuesday (August 30) after an Indian tourist died while being transferred between hospitals in the capital city of Lisbon. The woman was around seven months pregnant and had complained of shortness of breath.
The Portuguese government said in a statement that Dr Temido had “realised that she no longer had the conditions to remain in office”, reported the BBC. The report quoted Portuguese news agency Lusa as saying Prime Minister António Costa had said that the Indian woman’s death was “the last straw” that led to Dr Temido’s resignation. In June this year, Reuters reported a shortage of obstetricians in Portuguese hospitals, resulting in the temporary shutting down of emergency maternity units, or operations with reduced staff.
The tragedy in Portugal and its fallout recalls in some ways the death in 2012 of a pregnant Indian woman due to sepsis in a hospital in Ireland. Savita Halappanavar was denied a potentially life-saving abortion due to the country’s conservative laws on abortion. The death of Savita Halappanavar led to mass outrage over the systemic issues women faced because of the restrictions on abortions and led to legal challenges — which ended with the overturning of the ban on abortion.
Savita Halappanavar was a 31-year-old dentist from Karnataka who went to Ireland with her Indian husband after their wedding. In the 17th week of her pregnancy, she complained of back pain and was admitted to the hospital. Her husband Praveen Halappanavar said the couple was told by doctors that a miscarriage was happening.
At the same time, their request for abortion given her deteriorating medical condition was not considered, with at least one doctor and one midwife reiterating Ireland was a Catholic country, so the possibility for doctors performing an abortion was extremely low as long as a heartbeat was detected in the foetus.
Halappanavar delivered a dead baby girl three days later. She herself remained in critical condition in intensive care, where she died after a few days after suffering a heart attack caused by septicaemia or infection in the blood.
Soon after Savita’s death, an inquiry into the cause of her death was set up. Apart from the conclusion that abortion could have saved her life, a few procedural steps were also found to be lacking in terms of the care given to Savita while she was hospitalised, such as the failure to chart observations of vital signs every four hours, an “inordinate delay” in reporting back on blood samples, and issues relating to note-taking.
However, for the larger public, the issue boiled down to the refusal of abortion. At that time, under Irish law, abortion was criminal unless it occurred as a result of a medical intervention performed to save the life of the mother, and this exception was applied in rare cases. In Halappanavar’s case, there was some confusion among doctors about whether her case qualified.
In July 2013, the government introduced a bill that would allow for abortion in a few cases, marking a major change. The Irish Roman Catholic Church strongly condemned the legislation as a move to “licence the direct and intentional killing of the innocent baby”.
Even before Halappanavar’s death, the issue was a polarising one. Women in Ireland had to travel to other countries, most commonly the UK, for an abortion procedure. But the details of this case and the preventable nature of her death became an emotive issue that caught the focus of young women in Ireland. Halappanavar’s story and her face became important symbols of the movement, depicted in rallies often.
Following a citizens’ body recommendation, a referendum was held in 2018 for overturning the 8th Amendment of the constitution, which effectively did not allow for abortions. Then Prime Minister of Ireland, Leo Varadkar, openly supported the “Yes” movement for overturning the amendment. “I said in recent days that this was a once-in-a-generation vote. Today I believe we have voted for the next generation,” he said.
The referendum saw a 66% majority vote for overturning the ban on abortions. Today, abortions can be requested until the 12th week of pregnancy and can be considered in case of threats to the mother’s life.
