Pro-lifers ‘Women for Life’ claim morning-after pill could encourage rape

A new women’s pro-life organisation has warned that the morning-after pill could encourage rape and abusive behaviour by men, and that it is linked with increased sexual promiscuity.

Women for Life – a new pro-life NGO led by Elena Micallef-Borg who also sat on the board of the Gift of Life Foundation – warned that the legislation of the morning-after pill would conflict with Malta’s anti-abortion laws.

“It is highly concerning that a hundred women claim to represent and to have filed the judicial protest on behalf of all Maltese women, citing women’s reproductive freedom,” the group said. “The morning-after pill has today been promoted as a planner for women and couples to plan and decide on number, spacing and timing of their children, assumingly aimed at decreasing unwanted and unintended pregnancies. Existing bodies of evidence have shown that there is no correlation between easy access to the morning-after pill and a decrease in unintended pregnancies.”

Women for Life also cited studies linking the easy availability of the morning-after pill with increased sexual promiscuity “as one’s ‘mistake’ may become easily ‘corrected’ by resorting to the morning-after pill. "The morning-after pill in other countries also appears to have encouraged abusive behaviour and rape by men, allowing male perpetrators to cover their crimes by forcing the morning-after pill to their female victims.”

The group issued its statement after 102 women and the Women’s Rights Organisation filed a judicial protest against the ban of emergency contraception, arguing that it breached their fundamental rights as women.

The women, spearheaded by human rights lawyer and women’s rights campaigner Lara Dimitrijevic, are demanding licensing, importation and distribution of emergency contraception in Malta.

Three other pro-life organisations -  Life Network Foundation, Gift of Life and Malta Unborn Child Movement – described the morning-after pill as an abortifacient”.

“Human embryonic life starts from conception. The egg released from the woman is fertilized by the sperm and the embryo created continues to grow as the new human life travels down to implant in the mother’s womb,” they said in a joint statement. “One of the effects of the morning-after pill or emergency contraception is the alteration of the lining of the womb such that the embryo will not be able to implant and is thus intentionally lost. This is called the anti-nidation effect and is abortifacient.”