Vietnam to ban abortion of unwanted female foetuses
HANOI - Vietnam plans new legislation aimed at stamping out abortion of unwanted female foetuses, a government official said on Thursday.
An official at the Committee for Population and Family Planning said an ordinance to be submitted to the National Assembly's Standing Committee for approval would make clear it was illegal to abort foetuses because of their sex.
An existing ordinance makes diagnosis to determine the sex of unborn babies illegal, but this had not prevented the practice and abortion of unwanted female foetuses, said Dinh Cong Thoan, head of the drafting team.
"The new version of the ordinance bans the selection of the sex of unborn babies by any means, which covers a wider range of activities to determine sex," he said.
Another population official said that despite the existing rule, parents were able to find out the sex of foetuses through routine pre-natal scans.
"Pregnant women are encouraged to check their future child, even to have tests regularly to protect their health. So they are able to find out whether they will have a boy or a girl," he said.
"But the new ordinance clearly states the parents cannot carry out such scans just to abort a foetus if they find out it's a girl."
Vietnam has one of the highest rates of abortion in the world, one of the reasons for which is a preference for male offspring stemming from the country's Confucian traditions.
Government figures show that in 2000, Vietnam recorded 217,691 voluntary abortions, 30,865 natural abortions and 470,338 pregnancy terminations through "menstrual regulation" a process of induced abortion in the early weeks of pregnancy.
Females still outnumber males in Vietnam, but the size of the male population is growing fast. In 2001 males made up 49.16 percent of the population, compared with 48.80 percent in 1991.
Vietnam had a population of 78.69 million people in 2001.
By Dinh Pham Tran - Reuters - July 04, 2002.
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