Reproductive System & Sexual Disorders: Current Research
Open Access
ISSN: 2161-038X
+44 1300 500008
ISSN: 2161-038X
+44 1300 500008
Samuel Nii Amarlai Nathan
Kumasi South Hospital, Ghana
Scientific Tracks Abstracts: Reprod Syst Sex Disord
Statement of the Problem: Conscientious objection (CO) to legal abortion is a clinician’s refusal to provide a legal abortion because of their own moral or religious beliefs, and is one of the barriers to accessing safe abortions in Ghana. For a country that has one of the most liberal abortion laws in Sub-Saharan Africa, it is unacceptable to have unsafe abortions as one of the major causes of maternal mortality in the country. There have been a few studies in the past concerning this subject, but fewer have focused on Ghana, and none has explored the problem in the region that is notorious to having one of the highest unsafe abortion rates in Ghana. Judging that conscientious objection is an important contributing factor to accessing safe abortions, it is imperative that we have extensive data on the prevalence of conscientious objection in order to know the magnitude of the problem to be tackled. Methodology: This study was a cross-sectional study among healthcare providers who are trained to perform legal abortion services across various hospitals in the Techiman Municipality. Primary data was taken from these healthcare providers via a structured self-administered questionnaire. Findings: Overall, 50.47% of the healthcare providers in the Techiman Municipality consider themselves to be conscientious objectors to legal abortion although the healthcare providers demonstrated a high level (80.61%) of knowledge on the abortion law in Ghana. Despite the increased prevalence of conscientious objection among medical doctors (63.63%), only 25% reported that their objection had to do with the surgical procedures performed after 12 weeks gestation. Conclusion: The findings suggest that conscientious objection to legal abortion is prevalent in the Techiman Municipality and by extension, Ghana. As such, policies should be formulated by the Ministry of Health and the Ghana Health Service to regulate the practice of conscientious objection to legal abortion among healthcare providers
Samuel Nathan is a young medical doctor from Ghana who has six years’ experience in Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights (SRHR), including advocating for SRHR at three high-level meetings of the World Health Organization. He is poised to dedicating his medical career to help underprivileged countries achieve better health outcomes with SRHR in focus