The new law also says that women with disabilities will not need the consent of their legal guardians.
The recently approved law also determines that having had an abortion is to be removed from the woman’s clinical history after five years.
Contraception, sex education, and surrogacy
Under the law, the distribution of barrier contraceptive methods will be increased in institutes, prisons, and social services centers.
At the same time, according to the national government, the law provides for the promotion of research on male contraception for the sake of “the co-responsibility of men.”
In addition, the morning-after pill will be available free of charge in outpatient clinics and in the new “public centers for specialized care in sexual and reproductive rights.”
Another of the law’s provisions is obligatory sex education based on gender ideology in all educational levels, promoting the use of contraceptives, sexual promiscuity, and same-sex relationships between people beginning in early childhood.
The law classifies as “forms of reproductive violence” forced pregnancy, abortion, sterilization, and contraception as well as surrogate motherhood.
‘The end of abortion is in our prayers’
ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner, asked Spanish pro-life organizations for their assessment of the new abortion law.
The Spanish branch of 40 Days for Life considers the new law to be “a death sentence for Spain” and that “the institutions that look after the good of citizens have failed us.”
(Story continues below)
Subscribe to our daily newsletter
The organization charged that “those who have taken a pro-life position have looked the other way for more than 13 years.” In a veiled reference to the People’s Party, 40 Days for Life pointed out that now “they applaud the law that takes away the right to life of so many innocents.”
The pro-life prayer movement criticized the decrease in information available to women at risk of abortion and pointed out that “to choose freely is to have all the available information accessible to each woman who is considering an abortion.”
The organization pointed out that abortion is a procedure “in which the life of the mother is also in danger” and that “continuing with a pregnancy despite the difficulties is possible.”
On Feb. 22, coinciding with Ash Wednesday, 40 Days for Life begins its spring campaign in 21 cities in Spain.
Nicolás Jouve de la Barreda, the president of the Association of Researchers and Professionals for Life and former member of the Spanish Bioethics Committee, said the passage of the law amounts to “a real work of ‘social engineering’ that has been going on for years to create a state of opinion in favor of something as inhuman as abortion.”
Both this law and the euthanasia law “are deceptive laws, because they hide the truth, are based on falsehoods, and attack principles traditionally maintained by society,” Jouve said.