The Helms amendment is a law barring U.S. foreign assistance from being used for abortion services. This fact sheet describes the negative impact of the Helms amendment in Nepal. The country liberalized its abortion law in 2002 and the right to safe motherhood and reproductive health was guaranteed by the 2015 Constitution. In 2018 the Right to Safe Motherhood and Reproductive Health Act further ensured that women and girls in Nepal have the right to access safe, legal abortion free of charge at public health facilities. Yet due in great part to U.S. funding restrictions like the Helms Amendment, Nepal’s reproductive health care provision is fragmented and needlessly inefficient, putting the most burden on women and girls seeking abortion care.
Country: Nepal
A mixed methods evaluation of the Youth Focused Social Network Initiative for safe abortion in Rupandehi, Nepal
The Youth Focused Social Network Initiative was a program to increase young women’s knowledge of and skills in accessing comprehensive abortion care in Rupandehi, Nepal from 2012-2014. The program trained peer educators to provide information and support related to comprehensive abortion care and encouraged adults to support youth in their communities. This study evaluated the effectiveness of the program and found that it had produced positive results in youth knowledge of and attitudes about comprehensive abortion care. Program expansion should be considered in light of continued need in Nepal.
Determination of medical abortion eligibility by women and community health volunteers in Nepal: A toolkit evaluation
Pathways to safe abortion in Nepal
Improving health worker performance of abortion services: An assessment of post-training support to providers in India, Nepal and Nigeria
A better place for women: Abortion care in Nepal a decade after law reform
Empowering women workers through youth-led education on reproductive health and safe abortion in Nepal
Enhancing the quality of abortion care: Successful initiatives to improve clinical skills and facility services
This report looks at initiatives in four countries—Nigeria, Nepal, Ghana and Zambia—where Ipas is working with governments, communities and other partners to provide clinical and programmatic support to providers and health-care facilities.
Expansion of safe abortion services in Nepal through auxiliary nurse-midwife provision of medical abortion, 2011-2013
Abortion in Nepal
What contraception do women use after abortion? An analysis of 319,385 cases from eight countries
Abortion stigma is global
The stigma that often surrounds abortion and anyone associated with it—women, providers, pharmacists and advocates—contributes to abortion’s social, medical and legal marginalization. At Ipas, we know that stigmatizing abortion is inherently harmful to women’s health — preventing them from getting the care they deserve.