France offers free condoms to young people and free emergency contraception to all women
Free condoms are now available to young people under the age of 26 at French pharmacies as part of what President Emmanuel Macron has called “a small revolution in preventative healthcare”. The new health strategy aims to curb the spread of sexually transmitted infections among young people in France. It was initially aimed at those aged 18-25, but was later extended to minors. The measure is because health authorities estimated that the rate of STIs in France increased by about 30% in 2020-2021, Reuters news agency reported.
Emergency contraception will also be available for free to all women without a prescription as of 1 January, according to a tweet from government spokesperson Olivier Veran. Since 1 January 2022, French women under the age of 26 already had access to free contraception. This included consultations with doctors or midwives and medical procedures associated with their chosen contraceptive.
SOURCE: CNN, by Inke Kappeler, Joseph Ataman, 2 January 2023 + VISUAL Adobe Stock
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Pourquoi et comment constitutionaliser le droit à l’avortement
(Why and how to constitutionalise abortion law)
by Stéphanie Hennette-Vauchez, Diane Roman, Serge Slama
La Revue des Droits de l’Homme (Review of Human Rights), July 2022
Abstract
Following the shock wave caused by the Dobbs decision of the Supreme Court of the United States of June 24, 2022, the debate to formally include the right to abortion in the French Constitution opened with the filing of a constitutional bill. Contrary to the various constitutionalists who have expressed reservations about the usefulness or relevance of such constitutionalisation, we defend the idea that a historic opportunity has arisen to open up, in a pioneering way, the constitutional text to reproductive questions. Such a choice is justified both by the symbolic functions of the Constitution and by a practical interest: to guarantee the sustainability of reproductive rights.
Main sections
I. The legitimacy of constitutionalisation with regard to the symbolic functions of Constitutions.
II. The practical issues of the constitutionalisation of abortion and reproductive rights.
III.The authors are professors of public law at the University of Paris Nanterre, University of Paris 1, and University of Grenoble-Alpes, respectively
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