Continuous difficulties

The government included abortion in the list of procedures for which doctors will have to receive a separate license. The corresponding decision signed by Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, dated December 8, was published on Monday on the official portal of legal information.

The document enters into force in December 2017 - "after one year from the date of its official publication."

Until now, RBC notes , to conduct abortion there was enough license in the general direction "Obstetrics and gynecology." Oleg Sagalai, spokesman for the head of the Ministry of Health Veronika Skvortsova, told the publication that the changes are explained by the desire of the department to keep records of institutions in which abortion is carried out. The data received following the results of the payments of the compulsory medical insurance fund was not enough, the official continued, because some of the abortions were not carried out at the expense of the Federal Antimonopoly Service.

Meanwhile, the lawyer Marie Davtyan, who specializes in the protection of women's rights, noted RBC that any additional license requirement leads to an increase in prices for services in commercial clinics. Many of them, according to the lawyer, will refuse to carry out abortion, and that to seriously reduce the availability of this operation.

“There was no need for a separate license,” said Davtyan. “This is just another desire to limit women's access to abortion. There are no problems with statistics.”

Earlier it became known that on the day of signing the decree, December 8, the expert group of the government by a majority vote rejected the initiative to remove abortion from the compulsory medical insurance system . “Society and the state do not have the right to make cannibalous decisions,” explained the head of the group, Minister for Open Government, Mikhail Abyzov.

During the meeting, the deputy head of the Ministry of Health Dmitry Kostennikov said that his department did not support the initiative, since it will lead to discrimination of women.

At the withdrawal of abortions from the compulsory medical insurance system, the Russian Orthodox Church and public organizations associated with it insist. Patriarch Kirill repeatedly noted that such a measure would be the first step on the way to a complete legislative ban on abortion.