Until Friday, only surgical abortions were possible in Japan. However, access to the medicinal method remains subject to several conditions, including the authorization of the husband of the pregnant woman.
It’s a small revolution in a very conservative archipelago on issues related to women’s rights: Japan has for the first time authorized the marketing of a pill to terminate a pregnancy, after several years of mobilization of health specialists and feminist movements. This pill can be used up to nine weeks of pregnancy.
The decision to authorize the medicinal device “MeFeego”, marketed by the British laboratory Linepharmawas taken Friday by the pharmaceutical council of the Japanese Ministry of Health, reports the American media CNN. It should be validated shortly by the government. This marketing comes after the vote of an authorization in principle of the abortion pills by the Japanese Parliament in June 2022.
The long road to the abortion pill in Japan
Until now, only surgical abortions were possible in the country, with the exception of emergency devices, nicknamed “morning after pills”, authorized since 2011. It also happens that some doctors prescribe abortion pills ordered from the stranger.
Apart from these exceptions, abortions in Japan are carried out in two forms: the so-called “evacuation” method, which consists of aspirating the uterine tissues with a small tube, and curettage, which involves removing these tissues manually using an instrument that scrapes the endometrium, the inner part of the uterus.
The World Health Organization (WHO) now considers the curettage method “obsolete” more painful and dangerous. She recommends replacing it with the evacuation method or the drug method.
The Japanese Ministry of Health authorized the marketing of the abortion pill based on the molecule mifeprisotone (recommended by the World Health Organization) several decades after its development in 1982 and its first legalization in France and China in 1988. Will follow the United Kingdom in 1991, Sweden in 1992 then 90 other countries since 1999. Pending the final validation of the authorization in Japan, Argentina is to date the last country to have legalized this medicinal solution, in March 2023.
In the United States, the Supreme Court decided on Saturday to temporarily uphold the authorization for the marketing of abortion pills. But the battle is not definitively won for advocates of medical abortion.
Access to abortion remains difficult
Japanese law still prohibits abortion in the texts but it provides enough recourse for acts of voluntary termination of pregnancy (IVG) to be possible and practiced in the country, and this up to 22 weeks.
But in reality, the barriers to abortion are numerous. Under Japanese law, women can only abort if the pregnancy “endangers their health” or is the result of rape. In reality, these rules are above all dissuasive and do not effectively prevent recourse to abortion.
Two other barriers can however really prevent it: the agreement of the husband, if the pregnant woman is married, is regularly requested by the doctors. Japan is one of eleven countries in the world allowing abortion to impose such a condition and it is the last country of the G7 to do so.
The barrier can also be financial: if we do not yet know the price of the abortion pill which should be marketed soon, surgical abortions for pregnancies less than twelve weeks can cost between 100,000 and 200,000 yenor between 700 and 1400. Prices rise for abortions performed after twelve weeks.
Japan is often considered conservative on so-called “society” issues, including women’s rights. The Japanese state is in 116th place out of 146 in the world ranking on equality between women and men drawn up by the World Economic Forum.
