Minors and abortion

Many jurisdictions have laws applying to minors and abortion. These parental involvement laws require that one or more parents consent or be informed before their minor daughter may legally have an abortion.

Law in Canada
In Canada, abortion is subject only to medical legislation, and there are no laws regulating abortion. Under the Canadian health care system, abortion is available on request, regardless of the woman's age or trimester of her pregnancy. Confidentiality laws protect minors' rights to withhold information regarding prescription medication or medical procedures such as abortions from their guardian(s). Therefore, contraception does not require parental consent, and for medication such as birth control, only a doctor's prescription is required. Medical care facilities in Canada by law observe a minor's right to medical confidentiality, and they do not have the authority to share medical information with a parent without consent of the patient. In 1989, the Supreme Court ruled the father has no right in vetoing a woman's decision to undergo an abortion, regardless if he is her spouse or not. Abortion is fully funded by the government in most provinces, and therefore Canadian citizens are not required to pay for an abortion themselves.

Law in the United States
In the United States, most states typically require one of two types of parental involvement – consent and/or notification. As of November 2006, 34 states required some type of parental involvement in a minor's decision to have an abortion--21 states require one or both parents to consent to the procedure, 11 require one or both parents be notified and 2 require both consent and notification before an elective abortion can occur. Parental involvement laws played a key role in forcing the Court to clarify its position on abortion regulation. The Court ruled, in essence, that parental involvement laws (and all other abortion regulation) can legally make it more difficult for a female to acquire an abortion. But there is a threshold beyond which the increased difficulties become unconstitutional. Requiring spousal consent before a woman can acquire an abortion has been interpreted as falling on the unconstitutional side of that threshold, while parental involvement has been interpreted as falling on the constitutional side. Or, to use the language of Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey (1992), spousal consent laws place an "undue burden" on a woman's ability to get an abortion, whereas parental involvement laws do not.

Parental involvement laws have three basic features. First, they are binding on minors, not adults. Second, they require, at minimum, that minors notify their parents before an abortion is performed, and in some cases consent from the parents. And third, they allow minors to acquire a judicial bypass if consent cannot be acquired. These regulations are but one example of the detailed fabric of abortion legislation and regulation that has evolved since the Supreme Court's decision to legalize abortion in its 1973 Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton.

The first major case involving parental involvement legislation was decided in 1976 in Planned Parenthood of Central Missouri v. Danforth. This case involved a Missouri law that required consent from various parties before an abortion could be performed - written consent by the patient, spousal consent for married individuals, and parental consent for minors, specifically. The court ruled that the parental consent provision was unconstitutional due to its universal enforcement.

The ability of a minor to acquire an abortion against her parent's wishes became a recurring theme in several more cases following Planned Parenthood of Central Missouri v. Danforth. Bellotti v. Baird (1979) addressed a Massachusetts law that required a minor to acquire parental consent before an abortion was performed. But, unlike the Danforth case, this law allowed for judicial bypass if consent could not be acquired. Similar reasoning can be found in H.L. v. Matheson (1981). This case ruled on the relatively milder regulation of parental notification as opposed to parental consent. In this case, the Court ruled that parental notification is constitutional since the parent could not veto the adolescent's final decision to acquire an abortion. In Planned Parenthood of Kansas City v. Ashcroft (1983), the Supreme Court ruled conclusively on the constitutionality of parental consent laws – parental consent was found to be constitutional so long as it also allowed a judicial bypass if such consent could not be acquired. In Planned Parenthood of S.E. Pennsylvania v. Casey (1992), the Court placed parental involvement firmly within a broader set of legal principles governing a woman's constitutional right to an abortion. Parental involvement, and other regulations, were constitutional so long that they did not place an "undue burden" on a woman's ability to acquire an abortion.

Arguments in support
Advocacy groups have made a number of arguments in favor of parental notification.


 * Minors must have parental approval for most types of medical procedures.
 * A study by the Heritage Foundation stated that overall, parental involvement laws reduce the number of teenage abortions.
 * The pregnant minor might be pressured into having an abortion by an older boyfriend, so as to conceal the fact that he is guilty of statutory rape.
 * Currently, the parents of the minor are financially responsible for any complications resulting from the abortion.
 * Notification and consent laws give parents a chance to counsel their teenage daughters about the possible consequences of abortion.

Arguments in opposition
Advocacy groups on the other side have also made a number of arguments against parental notification:


 * Most professional medical societies oppose parental notification laws. These include the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Academy of Family Physicians, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, the American Society for Reproductive Medicine, and the American Medical Women's Association.
 * Parental notification and consent laws increase the numbers of back alley abortions:
 * In states that have notification or consent laws, there has been an increase in unsafe, illegal, "back alley" abortions.
 * Many young women feel they cannot talk to their parents about their sex lives or about rape or incest that they may have suffered, and may seek illegal abortions as a result.
 * In states that have notification or consent laws, teenagers will sometimes travel to a nearby state to have an abortion.
 * In general, the only situation where a minor would not consult her parents about an abortion is in a dysfunctional family situation, where the minor's parents lack the basic competence to be entrusted with the decision about the minor's pregnancy.
 * Delays mean increased risks:
 * Delaying an abortion even if only by a couple of days, increases the likelihood of complications arising from abortion procedures. In fact, legal abortions before the third trimester are less dangerous than childbirth for teens as they are 24 times more likely to die from childbirth complications than from a legal abortion performed in the first trimester. However, the risk of death or major complications significantly increases for each week into pregnancy, particularly if the abortion is delayed until the third trimester.
 * Judge Nixon of The District Court in Tennessee estimated "that even under the best of circumstances, the [judicial] waiver process would take twenty-two days to complete - a significant problem given the time-sensitive nature of pregnancy and the increased risk involved in later abortions."
 * The American Academy of Pediatrics stated that "Legislation mandating parental involvement does not achieve the intended benefit of promoting family communication, but it does increase the risk of harm to the adolescent by delaying access to appropriate medical care...[M]inors should not be compelled or required to involve their parents in their decisions to obtain abortions, although they should be encouraged to discuss their pregnancies with their parents and other responsible adults."
 * An American Medical Association study in 1992 showed that mandatory parental involvement laws "increase the gestational age at which the induced pregnancy termination occurs, thereby also increasing the risk associated with the procedure."
 * A study of abortions by researchers at Baruch College at City University of New York showed that Texas teens who were between 17 years, 6 months old and 18 years old were 34% more likely to have an abortion in the much riskier second trimester than young women who were 18 or older when they became pregnant.
 * Lawrence Finer, spokesperson for the Guttmacher Institute said: "It just shows how laws like this can lead to health risks for teens. Abortion is a safe procedure, but it's less safe later in the pregnancy." He suggest that parental involvement laws have a small effect on abortion rates compared with improved sexual education and birth control access and usage.
 * Studies have found that mandatory parental notification for contraceptives would drastically decrease a teen's use of sexual health care services, potentially increasing pregnancies and the spread of STDs.