March 8, 2023 and we are still fighting for fundamental rights. We are still fighting for safety, for solidarity, for a non-violent world. Today we are talking about access to abortion, which in recent years has become a source of profit, paid for by us with our bodies and lives.

As violence against women remains a daily part of our lives, restricting access to abortion and wider reproductive health services is just another layer of violence. Our bodies are turned into battlefields, into objects to be assaulted, into vehicles to produce and reproduce society and profit, into sources of validation for patriarchy – but never seem to be ours.

Today we take our bodies back, all together. Our womb is not your profit!

We are taking to the streets today to condemn any initiative that results in the limitation of public abortion services on demand and the violation of the right to decide about one's own body. We are taking to the streets to draw attention to the devastating effects such measures can have on the integrity and autonomy of women, but also on families, communities and society as a whole.

We are taking to the streets to sound the alarm about the large number of underage mothers in Romania, a situation aggravated by the fact that many of the cases are a result of sexual violence, grooming and pedophilia.

We are taking to the streets to repeat time and time again that sex education is essential in preventing unwanted pregnancies among teenage girls and not only - but also the fight against sexism, against the belief that men should dominate and possess women. We go to the streets to demand our rights, and because if we don't go out, no one will.

We oppose the political and economic interests that treat us as instruments of demographic regulation, as sources of profit and forced reproductive labor. Reproductive work is work, and forced reproductive work is violence. Giving birth and raising children, doing the enormous work of caring for the family and its members, domestic, emotional work and all the work that reproduces our daily life is, in a word, work! Work – and not the essence of any supposed feminine condition that would thus render invisible the enormous collective effort of women, unrecognized and often forced and exploited for profit and domination.

Today, we affirm that reproductive work is work. And forced reproductive labor is violence. Forced motherhood is violence. And any form of restricting access to abortion is a fundamental violation of reproductive rights.

We stand against misogynistic religious fanaticism and right-wing extremist ideologies that support measures to curtail the rights of women, mothers, queer people, Roma women and other vulnerable groups in the name of so-called national ideals. We oppose the religious groups infiltrated at the level of the so-called crisis centers that promote scientifically unfounded lies and manipulate people who want to have an abortion by guilt.

We oppose racist ideologies that support the sterilization of Roma women and women with disabilities. We denounce economic constraints by the state and private companies that keep poor people out of access to reproductive health services, contraceptives, and a decent living to raise a child.

Just like during the period of Decree 770/1966, which prohibited abortions for 23 years, decreasing access to terminations of pregnancy on demand will not lead to a decrease in the number of abortions or to a lower demand, but to an increase in the number of empiric abortions, carried out in non-sterile conditions, in the absence of medical personnel, outside a hospital or medical practice, as well as the increase in the number of deaths.

At least 10,000 women dead as a result of clandestine abortions, tens of thousands of children abandoned in orphanages, the increase in the incidence of depression and sexual problems - these were some of the ill effects of the nationalist pro-natalist policy of the years 1966-1989. The pretext of population growth made through femicide and organized violence can only be violence and today we call it violence. Our mothers, aunts and grandmothers have gone through these bloody years of decree 770 with infinite pain. Their voices will not be drowned! Their history will not be forgotten!

And today we say with them, in one voice: Their history will not be repeated! We will not allow our bodies or our earned rights to be taken from us.

In the period 2020-2021, out of 171 state hospitals, only 59 performed abortions on demand. Doctors refuse such interventions in state hospitals, but some of them agree to perform abortions on demand in private offices, in exchange for enormous sums of money. For these doctors, pregnant people experiencing an unwanted pregnancy are seen as sources of profit.

Today, March 8, 2023, the situation remains at least as dire. Of the 171 hospitals, 51 cited religion as the main reason for refusing doctors, a reason that has no place in the public health system of a secular state. Access to reproductive health is both a fundamental right and a deontological medical obligation.

The medical abortion introduced by the Ministry of Health in 2020, in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, is very poorly promoted in hospitals, because the ministry did not provide any information or training for medical personnel regarding this way of terminating the pregnancy.

The network of family planning clinics has been left in recent years without funding for free contraceptives, which used to be given to people from vulnerable categories, poor women, schoolgirls and students.

In Romania, there is no national protocol or strategy that regulates access to contraceptive methods, although the World Health Organization considers that access to comprehensive health services, which include abortion, prevention of unwanted pregnancies and treatment of sexually transmitted diseases, means compliance human rights.

We record thousands of cases and thousands of deaths caused by cervical cancer, one of the cancers that can be avoided through prevention.

Today, we demand with the strength of our voices fed up with violence: We want access to reproductive health for all of us! We want free, free and safe abortion for every woman! We want private interests and extremist ideologies out of our womb!

Our uterus is NOT your profit!

OUR CLAIMS

By Ministry of Health:

• Settlement of the termination of pregnancy procedure on request through the budget of the Single National Health Insurance Fund.

• Introducing the provision of abortion services on demand in the accreditation procedure of hospitals with obstetrics and gynecology departments and monitoring the provision of abortion procedures (on demand and therapeutic).

• Establishing at national level a protocol on pregnancy terminations (on request, medicinal and therapeutic) containing clear specifications on the situations in which a patient can be refused, on the procedure itself, the rights and obligations of the parties, etc.

• Prohibition of false and pro-life information intended to discourage abortion through mandatory pre-abortion counseling in some hospitals. Establishing a pro-choice discourse, in pre-abortion counseling, based entirely on scientific data, medical information, not with the aim of discouraging from the start or blaming the person who calls for this procedure.

• Communicating through an online platform accurate, scientifically valid and unbiased information about on-demand, medical and therapeutic termination of pregnancy, but also providing a free telephone information line for people who want to know more information about this medical service.

• Collection of data on reproductive health procedures, including abortion procedures, carried out in private offices, clinics and hospitals.

• The introduction of post-abortion counseling following the abortion procedure, which includes information about the first 48 hours post-abortion, safe and healthy sexual relations, the contraceptive methods that the patient can use to prevent unwanted pregnancies.

• Ensuring that all women have access to information about contraceptives.

• Distribution of free contraceptives through family doctors' offices.

• Free HPV testing and free anti-HPV vaccination including for females up to 40 years of age.

• Training medical staff from an anti-racist, anti-classist, anti-homophobic, anti-transphobic, anti-ableist perspective, etc.

• The creation of specialized health services for the medical transition of transgender people, settled through the budget of the Single National Health Insurance Fund (endocrinological analyzes and consultations, psychological support, hormonal treatment).

• National implementation of the International Classification of Diseases Revision 11, adopted by the World Health Organization in 2019 and in force from January 1, 2022, in order to depathologize transgender identities and eliminate psychiatric diagnosis for transgender people.

• Prohibition of the medical evaluation procedure of transgender persons within the National Institute of Forensic Medicine, abusively requested by judges in civil status processes for the legal recognition of gender. This expertise is abusive, humiliating and contrary to the standards of the ECHR, which decouple the legal transition from the medical one and prohibit forcing transgender people to undergo surgical interventions as a precondition for the change of sex in civil status documents.

• Revise initial training programs in cooperation with medical schools to depathologize queer identities and align medical education with WHO standards. Currently, homosexuality and transgender identities are considered paraphilias (sexual deviations) in Romanian medical education, in contradiction with the international medical standards of the psychiatric profession.

 

 

To the authorities Central or Local Public Administrations that have public hospitals under their control:

• Monitoring the conditions under which access to abortions on demand is ensured throughout the year and whether the necessary medical personnel are provided according to the number of the population for each region, also taking into account the existing statistics (number of abortions annually, number of abortions of pregnancy in the case of minors, the number of terminations of pregnancy on request, etc.).

• Financing from the local budget of contraceptives settled for the population of the respective administrative-territorial unit, through the existing family planning offices at the county level.

• Eliminating and preventing all forms of violence against women and queer people in public or private spaces, online or offline, such as gender-based violence, domestic violence, femicide, abuse, harassment.

By College of Doctors from Romania:

• Harmonization of ethical norms, with emphasis on the doctor-patient relationship, the component of interrupting the relationship with the patient and the components of consent and confidentiality.

• To ensure that the initial training of doctors includes the practical elements for providing the service of termination of pregnancy by safe methods, in accordance with the latest standards approved by the WHO in the field.

• Inclusion of the theme of human rights in the health system by adopting a code of ethics for non-discrimination, gender equality, anti-racism, etc.

• Ensure that the initial and continuing training of doctors includes the practical elements for providing specific health services for queer people, including transition-specific medical services.

By hospital managers:

• Informing patients about the conditions and terms for accessing pregnancy termination services, including by publishing the information on the institution's web page.

• Temporarily, in the event that there are no medical personnel to perform or to assist in the performance of terminations of pregnancy upon request, to contract medical personnel willing to perform this intervention without any restraint of any kind.

By The Romanian parliament:

• Prohibition of any speech that promotes information that is biased, scientifically incorrect, or that could cause psycho-emotional harm to patients about any reproductive health medical procedure, including abortion on demand.

• Promoting full, fair and inclusive participation in decision-making processes at the institutional level to combat the effects of gender-specific barriers.

• Producing a data collection model that assesses the impact of gender-based public policies to generate institutional responses to femicide, gender-based violence, public health.

• Introducing the concept of intersectionality in sexual and reproductive rights legislation.

• Prohibition of conversion therapy: all efforts made by a psychologist or psychiatrist to change sexual orientation that does not fit into heteronormativity and queer identity. Conversion therapy is a psychological abuse of these people and does not give the expected results: the patients do not become heterosexual or cisgender, but face an increase in depression, anxiety and have an increased risk of suicide.

By Ministry of Education

• The introduction in the school curriculum for the primary cycle of a subject called "Relational Education" adapted to the age that includes information about society, public health, gender equality, diversity, emotional development and human relations.

• Elimination of compulsory religious education in the primary cycle.

• The introduction into the school curriculum of notions about the body, sexual relations, consent, means of contraception, abortion in the form of a subject called "Sexual Education" from the beginning of the secondary school cycle and not under vague terms that allow a wider interdisciplinary program such as "Health Education" or "Life Education".

• If the Ministry of Education encounters opposition and/or refusals against the introduction at national level of a subject called "Sexual Education" which includes a broad program on notions related to sexual life, we urgently request the approval of a project to introduce in schools introducing mandatory workshops for students to inform them about contraceptive methods (what the options are, how they can be accessed, how they should be used, etc.) and consent (what it is, its importance, the language of consent, the criteria for consent );

• Introducing into the school curriculum notions about forms of violence against girls and women (according to Law 217/2003) and notions about gender equality and the elimination of gender stereotypes (according to Law 202/2002).

• Approval of auxiliary textbooks addressing the topic of gender equality.

• Reducing urban-rural educational gaps in access to information about sexuality education and information about contraceptive methods.

• Distribution in high schools - through the school counselor - of condoms that are available to students upon request (this reform aims to reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies among young people);

• In order to prevent school dropout among minor mothers (according to Save the Children statistics: 83% of minor mothers drop out of school) we want to establish a system of resources and support, including special social grants, support provided by counselors, a treatment similar to that offered children with SEN (which also includes support teachers);

• Organization of bilingual education programs for Roma students, refugees from Ukraine and other countries, enrolled in state education.

By General Directorates of Social Assistance and Child Protection:

 

• Ensuring the access of young people in the protection system to sexual and reproductive health education, through family planning offices, gynecologists and school counselors.

• Pregnant minors in the protection system to have access to information on their rights, including the right to terminate a pregnancy.

• Ensuring access to contraception for all young people in the child protection system.

Organizers: Feminist collective #MThank you for the flowers

With the support of: E-Romnja Association, Front/Feminism Romania Association, Independent Midwives Association, Iele-Sânziene Association, GirlUp Romania, ACCEPT Association, Meduza Kolektiv

#8March #8Marchbuilds #thanks for the flowers #vort free #sexismulucid #giftsareall