When Jacinta Marete discovered that she was pregnant, she was in her first year in one of the public universities in the country. Having been among the chosen few who secure themselves a place in these institutions of higher learning, her dream of becoming a pharmacist was slowly shaping up.

But this new developments, threatened to deal a hard blow to a dream she had nurtured for many years. Only 19 years old, she felt like her world had fallen apart. “I was shattered, I knew my parents would be disappointed and that my boyfriend wouldn’t take responsibility, I had to do something drastic,’’ she said solemnly.

For about a week, Jacinta simply went through the motions as she tried to come to terms with this shocking news. But the more she thought about her predicament, the more she felt that for her, abortion was the better option.

“After a lot of thinking, I confided in a friend who assured me that she would help me have an abortion,” Jacinta explained. “She assured me that since it was only a month old, it wouldn’t be a problem.”

With abortion being illegal apart from when the life of the mother is at risk, Jacinta knew that it was going to be an unsafe abortion.

Although she says that she was afraid that something could go wrong, her desperation outweighed her fears “The thought of carrying a pregnancy to term was like my worst nightmare come true,” Jacinta explained.

“It was a seemingly harmless method because all I did was to swallow a certain concoction that this friend gave me, I didn’t even bother to ask what it was, all I needed was to get rid of the pregnancy.”

But things began to go terribly wrong after about an hour, she says that she started experiencing very painful contractions “This was just the beginning, I wasn’t prepared for what came later.”

At first, she says that the contractions, though painful, were spaced and she clung to the hope that they would stop with time but they became more and more intense.

“At some point, the pain became too much I could hardly breath. I have never felt such intense pain. At that point even death seemed like a good option,” she says in retrospect.

“That night I hardly slept, things got out of hand when I started bleeding profusely, it was like an artery had burst.”

Jacinta says that she was rescued by a fellow student, who had woken up to relieve herself and heard her whimpering in pain.

“By the time I was taken to the hospital in the school’s ambulance, I had resigned myself to fate, I didn’t see how I was going to recover from the heavy bleeding,” Jacinta adds sadly.

“There was blood all over. They had to complete the abortion and the process was devastatingly painful. I was put on the drip as doctors did the best they could in trying to safe my life.”

Even though Jacinta lived to tell her story, many girls in her situation hardly survive. They get to the hospital when it is too late. 

During last year’s Women Deliver Conference, Kenya was notably one of the countries in Africa where maternal mortality remains a major problem.

In light of this, Professor Joseph Karanja, a gynecologist in Nairobi, says that these deaths can and should be prevented through contraceptive information and services, good adolescent family life but most importantly, safe legal abortion care.

 “If legalizing abortion will save lives then so be it, right now we are training middle level providers on how to complete an abortion, yet we all want to imagine that unsafe abortion isn’t an issue,” said a gynecologist in Nairobi who requested anonymity.

“Somebody is starting these abortions but isn’t able to complete them, if women were able to access this service under trained medical care, things would be better.”

The gynecologist further adds that they encounter abortion-related complications on a regular basis and the situation is getting worse by day “last week I met a woman who has had seven abortions in three years.”

Experts say that in most cases, the women will have tried to terminate the pregnancy by themselves and by the time they get to the hospital, they are in such a bad state it is by sheer luck that some are able to give birth in future.

 “In extreme cases, we have to remove the uterus due to infection, but even the mild cases are traumatizing to the survivor because of the heavy bleeding,” the gynecologist emphasized.

“It’s not rare to find sticks and needles in the uterus as women try to perforate it in order to terminate the pregnancy.”

Although global maternal deaths due to bleeding after death constitute 25 percent 
of maternal deaths while those due to unsafe abortion constitute 13 percent, the
proportions vary from country to country.

Abortion contribution is higher in countries in sub-Saharan Africa reflecting poor access to safe abortion services.

In Nigeria and Kenya, the contribution of unsafe abortion is estimated at 30-35 percent.

“Surely, these are large numbers for a preventable/treatable condition,” Professor Joseph Karanja emphasized.

“Talking form a position of knowledge, I think that unsafe abortion completely changes ones life, the trauma caused by the horrifying near death experience is nothing to be taken lightly,” Jacinta expounded.

Even as the country aspires to attain the Millennium Development Goals, one of which is to reduce the maternal mortality, there is need to address unsafe abortion which is among the contributors.

An AWC Feature