Australian teen could get seven years in prison for home abortion

As mentioned in Friday’s What We Missed, 19 year-old Tegan Simone Leach could go to jail for up to seven years for having a home abortion. Leach’s 21 year-old boyfriend is also going to stand trial for “supplying drugs to procure an abortion.”

Police allege a family member obtained the abortion pill misoprostol from a doctor in the Ukraine and smuggled it into Australia on a flight to Cairns on December 25.
The pill was then allegedly successfully used by Ms Leach to terminate her pregnancy and induce a miscarriage at 60 days.
In their first court appearance on Thursday, it was alleged the pair did not ask about the lawful process to have an abortion.
Medical abortions are legal in Queensland but are often expensive with 90 per cent or more terminations performed in private clinics for a minimum out-of-pocket cost of about $370. But it remains an offence under the 100-year-old criminal code to access or procure an abortion.

Kate Marsh, of Children By Choice, said, “It comes as such a shock that someone can be charged with this offence in this day and age…We’d like to see abortion removed from the criminal code and be regulated like any other health procedure.”
Leach is believed to be the first woman charged in Queensland in nearly 50 years for having a home abortion.