Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s government maintains that the amendment doesn’t really change anything, but rather clarifies aspects of the 1978 law that legalized abortion — by allowing the activists into the centers where they weren’t permitted before.
“This was already included in the letter of the law, which we haven’t touched,” said Raffaele Nevi, a lawmaker in the prime minister’s coalition. “That’s the whole reason it got so easily approved: It changes nothing. … It’s just about applying it.”
Italy’s opposition says the latest national amendment has dealt women’s rights a “heavy” blow, noting that some regions, including Umbria and Marche, have already restricted access to the abortion pill.
“The right keeps on showing its nostalgic nature and its patriarchal and obscurantist vision, seeking every time to erode women’s rights,” said Silvia Roggiani, an opposition lawmaker with the center-left Partito Democratico. “While other countries progress in the protection of gender rights, it’s only shameful that Italy should be taking steps back.”
There has been a renewed focus on the issue of abortion in Europe since the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, which has resulted in restrictions on abortion in many parts of the country.
In February, France became the first country in the world to enshrine abortion rights in its constitution, while the European Parliament voted last week to include access to abortion in its Charter of Fundamental Rights. The resolution is nonbinding but has been welcomed by abortion rights groups nonetheless.
Meloni, who became prime minister in 2022, has promised not to change Italy’s abortion law, but finding a facility providing safe abortions is becoming increasingly difficult.
Italy legalized abortion with the approval of Law 194 in 1978, when the country was still staunchly Catholic. It allows women to seek a termination in the first 90 days of pregnancy. After that, an abortion can be performed only if there is a risk to the woman’s life or there are serious issues with the fetus.
Doctors can refuse to perform an abortion for reasons of conscience, and according to 2021 Health Ministry data, more than 60 percent of gynecologists won’t carry out the procedure.
Italy’s biggest antiabortion organization, Pro Vita e Famiglia (Pro-Life and Family), is among the groups that would be allowed to enter consultation clinics under the amendment. The groups have called for doctors who provide abortions to have a patient see the fetus and then hear its heartbeat before the procedure is carried out.
The organization has links to the U.S. antiabortion organization Heartbeat International, from which it has received nearly $100,000 in funding since 2014.
Jacopo Coghe, a spokesperson for Pro Vita, said that while the group has no intention of entering abortion consultation clinics, it must return to its “original function of helping women find concrete alternatives to abortion.”
While the amendment still needs approval in the Senate, there is little hope among opposition lawmakers that the measure can be halted.
The amendment “is already in — it’s a done deal,” Roggiani told The Post. “I don’t think it can be stopped.”
Brady reported from Berlin.
