In a column published on the Sunday newspaper website, a group of around thirty women and men calls for the creation of leave in the event of voluntary termination of pregnancy.
For once, it’s in this direction: to recover the good idea of certain companies to generalize it to France. This is the objective of a group that took up the pen in a column published in the Sunday newspaper. Lawyers, journalists, entrepreneurs or even feminists, some thirty of them are calling for the creation of automatic leave for all women undergoing voluntary termination of pregnancy.
On this path to better care for women, the professional branch of the Syntec Federation, which brings together unions in the consulting or digital fields representing nearly a million employees, recently signed an agreement providing for two days in the event of spontaneous termination of pregnancy – miscarriages – before 22 weeks. Spouses of employees may also benefit from leave of the same duration, if they are employed within a company in the branch.
The forum also welcomes the decision of the Carrefour group, which has chosen to grant three days to its employees for the same reason, thus allowing the women concerned to “not to be financially penalized by the loss of salary involved in taking sick leave, by circumventing the period of three unpaid waiting days”.
“The course of abortion retains a taste of illicit in labor law”
“But what about voluntary termination of pregnancy, for which there is still no dedicated leave?” wonder the signatories of the text published in the JDD. They lament that “In the collective unconscious, nearly 50 years after its legalization, abortion still resonates as a subversive act evoking unbridled sexuality or anarchic management of one’s fertility, in a society that expects women to be organized and cautious”. Hence their call to create “abortion leave” in good and due form through the law.
Currently, “the course of abortion retains a taste of illicit in labor law, while it concerns one in three women”. For the signatories, “dedicated leave would legitimize and affirm this fundamental right which is still exercised clandestinely vis-à-vis the professional sphere”. “We want our daughters and granddaughters to be able to abort without shame or loss of pay,” insist the signatories, including Elise Goldfarb and Julia Layani, creators of the Coming out podcast, or the Romanian film director, Radu Mihaileanu.
Their appeal comes as women’s rights associations have been mobilizing in recent weeks to obtain a response from the public authorities in the face of what they denounce as a shortage of abortion pills in France. Health Minister François Braun prefers to talk about «tensions». Many activists warn of the medical and psychological consequences for women faced with the risk of not finding this essential drug for a medical abortion. In France in 2021, 76% of abortions were medical.
Family planning, the collective Abortion Europe, women decide and the Observatory of transparency in medicines policies (OtMeds) launched last week an online petition to enjoin the State to act demanding from the Minister of Health the recognition of “the state of health emergency in terms of access to abortion”.
