From the op-ed by Nina Brooks, Eran Bendavid, and Grant Miller:
Few public policy issues are as divisive as abortion -- and to think that all sides could agree on even one aspect would seem naive. But based on our analysis of global data spanning two decades, we argue that there could yet be such an instance if we were to take the evidence seriously.
Our findings published in The Lancet Global Health last Thursday suggest that a major US global abortion policy has striking, important, and unintended consequences in sub-Saharan Africa.
The Mexico City Policy, also known by detractors as the "Global Gag Rule," was first introduced in 1984 by the Reagan administration at the United Nations International Conference on Population and Development, held in Mexico City. It prohibits private organizations from advocating abortion either explicitly or implicitly -- through counseling, referral, direct provision, or lobbying for policy or legal reform, as a precondition for receiving US federal family planning funding. Under the earlier Helms Amendment, organizations already could not use federal funds directly for abortion -- although funds are, of course, fungible.
