Doctors can provide qualified information about abortion, but the government finds it absurd and outdated when they face criminal penalties for doing so. The Bundestag is now deleting the corresponding paragraph.
He’s deleted. Paragraph 219a, which previously prohibited doctors in Germany from providing detailed public information about abortions, will be removed from the Criminal Code. The Bundestag decided on Friday morning with a large majority. The SPD, Greens and FDP had already set themselves the goal of ending 219a as soon as possible at the beginning of their term of government. Union and AfD, on the other hand, have been criticizing the new government’s draft law for months and have now also voted against the deletion. The previous session was emotional, with MPs repeatedly reacting to the speeches of their colleagues with angry heckling.
In their statement after the vote, the three leaders of the traffic light groups were certain: the new government had kept a promise to the citizens of Germany and was thus sending an important signal. Doctors will no longer be criminalized. Women now have the opportunity to get better information. “Without pressure and without criminalization,” said Britta Hasselmann (Greens).
Section 219a previously prohibited doctors from offering, announcing or promoting abortions for financial gain or if this was done in a grossly offensive manner. That all sounds as technical and abstract as possible, said Justice Minister Marco Buschmann (FDP) in his speech to the MPs. It is something very important, concrete and urgent.
After all, we live in a digital world. If a young woman deals with the difficult question of a possible termination of pregnancy, then she will usually get information online. This is the lowest-threshold offer. But “every troll and every conspiracy theorist can spread all sorts of things about abortions on the Internet,” says Buschmann. However, those who are highly qualified and who carry out the procedures – i.e. doctors – are forbidden to provide factual information on their websites under criminal punishment. That is absurd, outdated and unfair.
Today be a good day. Several speeches from the parliamentary groups of the FDP, SPD and Greens begin with this sentence. There is almost euphoria in the air. Federal Family Minister Lisa Paus (Greens) is also certain: “Today the decades of stigmatization of doctors end.” She thinks with empathy of all those women who have not received important information to which they were entitled for so long. She also spoke out in favor of setting up a commission to examine whether regulations for abortion outside the penal code are possible.
MEP Bär would like to see less party spirit in the other parliamentary groups
As expected, great criticism of the passing of the law came from the ranks of the AfD and the Union. For MP Dorothee Bär (CSU), the deletion of 219a is only a first step in order to subsequently remove paragraph 218 from the penal code and thus no longer classify abortions as a criminal offence. Don’t take into account the rights of unborn children. On such a day, she wishes there would be less party atmosphere in other factions.
The CDU also expressed concerns that deleting the paragraph would enable proactive advertising for abortions in magazines and on the Internet. Marco Buschmann emphasized that despite the deletion, there will be no commercial advertising. This is guaranteed by changes in the Medicines Advertising Act.