The termination of the late pregnancy in Serbian law and comparative European law

Abstract

The termination of the late pregnancy causes legal, medical and ethical dilemmas. This is due to the development of fetus if pregnancy is late one and complexity of the needed medical procedures. Legal regime of the termination of late pregnancy contains special conditions: legally stipulated indications and special procedure which means getting permission from particular body for the termination. In this article author compares legal regimes in: United Kingdom, France, Germany, Nordic countries, Switzerland, Italy, Russia, Check Republic and Serbia. Universal definition of the late pregnancy does not exist, but pregnancy after 24 weeks is considered late in Dutch law, and in the legal theory in United Kingdom. The time limit for termination of the pregnancy in some legislation is 24 weeks (e.g. Check Republic and Finland). According to Serbian law, there is a distinction of the pregnancy until 10 weeks, when termination is possible on pregnant woman's request, from 10 to 20 weeks when termination is decided by consilium of the physicians and after to 20 weeks when termination is decided by ethical committee. In the domestic law there is no distinction of the necessary indications for termination of the pregnancy after 10 weeks and after 20 weeks. Author suggest amendments to exisiting solutions. One, to postpone the termination on the requets until 12 weeks, and to stipulate different indications necessary for the termination pregnancy from 12 to 24 weeks and after 24 weeks - late pregnancy, in order to make the termination of the late pregnancy really exceptional.