Will US Women Travelling to Caribbean for Abortions Deepen Religious Divide Between Nations

The divide between abortion attitudes in the Caribbean is set to deepen as US women travel to the islands for treatment against a background of rising religious opposition.

The fall of Roe v Wade could have a ripple effect across the region, which has high rates of unwanted pregnancies, because it is easily influenced by the US and religious movements, activists said.

Attitudes towards abortion across the Caribbean vary widely, with some countries prohibiting reproductive care and others decriminalising it.

On some islands, the abortion policy is a throwback to colonial times when the British Empire exported the 1861 Offences Against the Person Act abroad. The act meant that performing an abortion or trying to self-abort could result in life imprisonment.

Reverend Patricia Sheerattan-Bisnauth, CEO of the Caribbean Family Planning Affiliation (CFPA), said striking down Roe v Wade was a “monstrous act of social injustice” that would “regress decades of progress”.

She warned it could spur on “religious fundamentalists in their pursuit of reinforcing patriarchal norms and values in families and societies”.

“It will have a negative impact in funding for family planning in the Caribbean which has low [family planning] prevalence and high rates of unwanted pregnancies, including high rates of adolescent pregnancies. These have a devastating impact, especially in exacerbating gender-based violence and increasing poverty.”

But countries that have decriminalised abortion, such as Cuba, Barbados and Guyana, may become cost-effective destinations for American women seeking safe care.

Other islands allow abortion for social and economic reasons, or in cases of rape and incest.

Some American states on the south coast, which are closest to the Caribbean, have restricted their abortion care.

Florida will soon have an abortion ban after 15 weeks of pregnancy while Alabama has already banned abortion with no exceptions for rape or incest, according to The New York Times tracker. In South Carolina, it is banned after six weeks and Mississippi may soon ban nearly all abortions.