Perceptions of abortion in contemporary urban Botswana

Abstract

The complications of unsafe, illegal abortion are a significant cause of maternal mortality in Botswana. The stigma attached to abortion leads some women to seek clandestine procedures, or alternatively, to carry the foetus to term and abandon the infant at birth. I conducted research into perceptions of abortion in urban Botswana in order to understand the social and cultural obstacles to women’s reproductive autonomy, focusing particularly on attitudes to terminating a pregnancy. I carried out 21 qualitative, semi-structured interviews with female and male urban adult Batswana. Further research is required to examine perceptions of abortion in rural areas. Restrictive laws must eventually be abolished to allow women access to safe, timely abortions. However, my findings suggested that socio-cultural factors, not punitive laws, present the greatest barriers to women seeking to terminate an unwanted pregnancy. These factors must be addressed so that effective local solutions to unsafe abortion can be generated.