Skip to content
Center for Reproductive Rights
Center for Reproductive Rights

Primary Menu

  • About
    • Overview
    • Center Leadership & Staff
    • Pro Bono Program
    • Creative Council
    • Annual Reports
    • Contact Us
    • Careers
    • Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
  • Work
    • Overview
    • Litigation
    • Legal Policy and Advocacy
    • Resources & Research
    • Recent Case Highlights
    • Landmark Cases
    • World’s Abortion Laws Map
    • After Roe Fell: Abortion Laws by State
  • Issues
    • Overview
    • Abortion
    • Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights
    • Assisted Reproduction
    • Contraception
    • Humanitarian Settings
    • Maternal Health
    • COVID-19
  • Regions
    • Overview
    • Africa
    • Asia
    • Europe
    • Latin America and the Caribbean
    • United States
    • Global Advocacy
  • News
    • Latest News
    • Center in the Spotlight
    • Events
    • Press Releases
    • Press Room
    • Newsletters
  • Resources
    • Resources & Research
    • World Abortion Laws Map
    • After Roe Fell: Abortion Laws by State
  • Act
    • Overview
    • Give
    • Act
    • Learn
  • Donate
    • Make a Gift Now
    • Be a Champion
    • Join the Advocates Council
    • Become a Major Donor
    • Give Through Your Donor-Advised Fund
    • Make a Gift In Honor
    • Attend an Event
    • Leave a Legacy
    • More Ways to Give
  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • YouTube
  • LinkedIn
Donate
icon-hamburger icon-magnifying-glass Donate
icon-magnifying-glass-teal

Abandoned By a Nation

Center for Reproductive Rights - Center for Reproductive Rights - search logo
search Close Close icon
Center for Reproductive Rights -
Menu Close Menu Close icon
Donate

Primary Menu

  • About
    • Overview
    • Center Leadership & Staff
    • Pro Bono Program
    • Creative Council
    • Annual Reports
    • Contact Us
    • Careers
    • Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
  • Work
    • Overview
    • Litigation
    • Legal Policy and Advocacy
    • Resources & Research
    • Recent Case Highlights
    • Landmark Cases
    • World’s Abortion Laws Map
    • After Roe Fell: Abortion Laws by State
  • Issues
    • Overview
    • Abortion
    • Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights
    • Assisted Reproduction
    • Contraception
    • Humanitarian Settings
    • Maternal Health
    • COVID-19
  • Regions
    • Overview
    • Africa
    • Asia
    • Europe
    • Latin America and the Caribbean
    • United States
    • Global Advocacy
  • News
    • Latest News
    • Center in the Spotlight
    • Events
    • Press Releases
    • Press Room
    • Newsletters
  • Resources
    • Resources & Research
    • World Abortion Laws Map
    • After Roe Fell: Abortion Laws by State
  • Act
    • Overview
    • Give
    • Act
    • Learn
  • Donate
    • Make a Gift Now
    • Be a Champion
    • Join the Advocates Council
    • Become a Major Donor
    • Give Through Your Donor-Advised Fund
    • Make a Gift In Honor
    • Attend an Event
    • Leave a Legacy
    • More Ways to Give
  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • YouTube
  • LinkedIn

Related Content

Issues:

Abortion, Legal Protections, Legal Restrictions, Contraception, Legal Protections, Legal Restrictions, Funding for Reproductive Healthcare

Regions:

Europe, Ireland

Work:

In the Courts, At the United Nations

Type:

News, Story

Case Archive

For updates on this case and others, explore our case archive here.

Follow the Center

Donate Now

Join Now

03.13.2014

In the Courts Abortion Europe News

Abandoned By a Nation

Justin Goldberg

Share this Story

  • facebook
  • Twitter
  • linkedin
  • Email id

The Center filed a new case against Ireland to stop its health care system from turning its back on women in desperate need of help.

It’s nearly impossible to go through this life and not encounter a serious medical issue. In those moments of fear, anxiety, and uncertainty, we desperately want information: about what has happened, what will happen, the choices we have, the consequences of our decisions. And we want that information from the people who should know best—doctors and other health professionals.



We filed another lawsuit this week against Ireland with the United Nations Human Rights Committee. A woman named Siobhán asked for our help to demand justice because of the horrendous treatment she experienced in her encounter with the Irish health care system, at a time when she was utterly vulnerable. When she needed doctors the most, they abdicated their responsibilities and abandoned her. They did so because of Ireland’s draconian law on abortion—a near absolute ban—and the deep-seated stigma it has instilled throughout the country.



Siobhán’s story is like many stories we hear coming out of Ireland. She and her husband were thrilled to give their 20-month old son a sibling. They even brought him to the 20-week ultrasound, in 2010, so he could see the sonogram image himself. But there wouldn’t be any joy that day.



A few minutes into the procedure, the sonographer told Siobhán that something was wrong. She did everything she could not to lose emotional control in an effort to avoid upsetting her son.



A doctor performed another scan and told her that she had the condition holoprosencephaly, a disorder caused by a chromosomal abnormality in which the fetus’ brain fails to fully develop. The doctor said that the fetus would likely die in the womb but could possibly go full term. But there was no chance of survival post birth. Then the doctor said, “In another jurisdiction, they would offer a termination, but obviously not in this country.” The doctor then advised Siobhán to carry on with the pregnancy “as normal.”



There was absolutely no way to continue “as normal.” The idea seems outrageous. It’s not hard to imagine the shock Siobhán felt. “It was as if we were in a bad dream,” she writes in her affidavit to the Human Rights Committee. “I was scared about how I was going to cope with potentially another 20 weeks of pregnancy.”



Perhaps even more stunning is the fact that Siobhán didn’t get any more information about her options. Not about what country might be able to help her, which hospitals specialized in her condition, what she could expect from a termination, whether she could count on emotional and medical support before and after the procedure, and how quickly she would need to make her plans. Nothing. She was abandoned by her doctors and by her country.



Siobhán joins many Irish woman who have suffered greatly under this callous law. “Ireland’s harsh policies made Siobhán fearful to even ask about her options and allowed her health care providers to simply give up on her once she made the decision to end her pregnancy,” says Johanna Westeson, the Center’s Regional Director for Europe, who filed the first action against Ireland with the Human Rights Committee in 2013.



Essentially booted from the Irish health care system, Siobhán had to gather enormous amounts of hard-to-find information and make the many complicated plans for having a serious medical procedure performed overseas. And she had to do this while keeping in mind the well-being of her son and taking a leave of absence from her job in an office without disclosing the reasons for her leave. Because of the deep-rooted stigma attached to abortion in Ireland, Siobhán felt compelled to keep the news about her failing pregnancy from nearly everyone she knew.



Like so many others, she traveled to Liverpool, home to a facility that has a reputation for high-quality, compassionate care. And not coincidentally, she described feeling like a criminal when she left her country—as so many women who had before her—because of all the circumstances and secrets kept.



In Liverpool, she received not only the information that all of us want in serious medical situations but counseling services that were so noticeably absent in her home country. But the Liverpool hospital could not help her after she had returned to Ireland. When she got home, Siobhán did not receive any bereavement counseling or other emotional support. She was left alone to deal with her grief and anger.



No matter how many times you hear the story of an Irish woman having “to travel”—the euphemism for pushing women to go abroad for the abortion services they can’t get at home—the details are never any less horrifying. What these women must do is not a crime. But the way they are treated by a heartless health care system truly is.


Related Posts

Decision: Amanda Mellet v. Ireland

Abortion, Legal Restrictions,Europe, Ireland,In the Courts, At the United Nations

Tysiac v. Poland: CRR Amicus Brief

Introduction1. The Center for Reproductive Rights submits these written comments pursuant to leave granted by the President of the Chamber...

Abortion,Europe, Poland, Accountability Bodies, European Human Rights System,In the Courts, Around the World

Center Submission regarding Constitutionality of Croatia’s Act on Health Measures for the Realization of the Right to Freely Decide on the Childbirth

Abortion, Legal Protections, Legal Restrictions, HIV/AIDS, Discriminatory Policies,Europe, Croatia,At the United Nations, Reporting on Rights

Sign up for email updates.

The most up-to-date news on reproductive rights, delivered straight to you.

Footer Menu

  • Careers
  • Privacy Policy
  • Contact Us

Center for Reproductive Rights
© (1992-2022)

Use of this site signifies agreement with our disclaimer and privacy policy.

Center for Reproductive Rights
This site uses necessary, analytics and social media cookies to improve your experience and deliver targeted advertising. Click "Options" or click here to learn more and customize your cookie settings, otherwise please click "Accept" to proceed.
OPTIONSACCEPT
Manage consent

Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience.
Necessary
Always Enabled
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
Functional
Functional cookies help to perform certain functionalities like sharing the content of the website on social media platforms, collect feedbacks, and other third-party features.
Performance
Performance cookies are used to understand and analyze the key performance indexes of the website which helps in delivering a better user experience for the visitors.
Analytics
Analytical cookies are used to understand how visitors interact with the website. These cookies help provide information on metrics the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc.
CookieDurationDescription
_ga2 yearsThis cookie is installed by Google Analytics. The cookie is used to calculate visitor, session, campaign data and keep track of site usage for the site's analytics report. The cookies store information anonymously and assign a randomly generated number to identify unique visitors.
_gat_UA-6619340-11 minuteNo description
_gid1 dayThis cookie is installed by Google Analytics. The cookie is used to store information of how visitors use a website and helps in creating an analytics report of how the wbsite is doing. The data collected including the number visitors, the source where they have come from, and the pages viisted in an anonymous form.
_parsely_session30 minutesThis cookie is used to track the behavior of a user within the current session.
HotJar: _hjAbsoluteSessionInProgress30 minutesNo description
HotJar: _hjFirstSeen30 minutesNo description
HotJar: _hjid1 yearThis cookie is set by Hotjar. This cookie is set when the customer first lands on a page with the Hotjar script. It is used to persist the random user ID, unique to that site on the browser. This ensures that behavior in subsequent visits to the same site will be attributed to the same user ID.
HotJar: _hjIncludedInPageviewSample2 minutesNo description
HotJar: _hjIncludedInSessionSample2 minutesNo description
HotJar: _hjTLDTestsessionNo description
SSCVER1 year 24 daysThe domain of this cookie is owned by Nielsen. The cookie is used for online advertising by creating user profile based on their preferences.
Advertisement
Advertisement cookies are used to provide visitors with relevant ads and marketing campaigns. These cookies track visitors across websites and collect information to provide customized ads.
CookieDurationDescription
_fbp3 monthsThis cookie is set by Facebook to deliver advertisement when they are on Facebook or a digital platform powered by Facebook advertising after visiting this website.
fr3 monthsThe cookie is set by Facebook to show relevant advertisments to the users and measure and improve the advertisements. The cookie also tracks the behavior of the user across the web on sites that have Facebook pixel or Facebook social plugin.
IDE1 year 24 daysUsed by Google DoubleClick and stores information about how the user uses the website and any other advertisement before visiting the website. This is used to present users with ads that are relevant to them according to the user profile.
IMRID1 year 24 daysThe domain of this cookie is owned by Nielsen. The cookie is used for storing the start and end of the user session for nielsen statistics. It helps in consumer profiling for online advertising.
personalization_id2 yearsThis cookie is set by twitter.com. It is used integrate the sharing features of this social media. It also stores information about how the user uses the website for tracking and targeting.
TDID1 yearThe cookie is set by CloudFare service to store a unique ID to identify a returning users device which then is used for targeted advertising.
test_cookie15 minutesThis cookie is set by doubleclick.net. The purpose of the cookie is to determine if the user's browser supports cookies.
Others
Other uncategorized cookies are those that are being analyzed and have not been classified into a category as yet.
CookieDurationDescription
adEdition1 dayNo description
akaas_MSNBC10 daysNo description
cookielawinfo-checkbox-functional1 yearThe cookie is set by GDPR cookie consent to record the user consent for the cookies in the category "Functional".
cookielawinfo-checkbox-others1 yearNo description
geoEdition1 dayNo description
next-i18next1 yearNo description
SAVE & ACCEPT
Powered by CookieYes Logo
Scroll Up