Abortion of the pregnancy: Why the coalition suddenly argues

Has the government made up of the Union and SPD to legalize the termination of pregnancy without anyone having to notice anything? What sounds absurd is discussed in the capital these days because the Union and the SPD now understand a sentence from the coalition agreement completely differently. What is behind it.

The debate from Frauke Brosius-Gersdorf-that is, the lawyer who proposed the SPD for a seat in the Federal Constitutional Court, to whom the Union initially approved before she then thought differently shortly before the decisive vote in the Bundestag. Brosius-Gersdorf, which is rejected by many in the CDU and CSU, among other things because of their position to legalize abortions, said in a talk show: “The coalition agreement has exactly what I have proposed.”

Because the coalition has decided to bear the costs for the demolition in more cases, the coalition agreement assumes “that the termination of pregnancy in the early phase is lawful”, because only for a legitimate intervention should the health insurance companies be covered – according to the Potsdam legal scientist.

The Union and SPD coalition agreement literally that “women in conflict situations” want to provide access to medically safe and close -place care. And, the crucial part: “We are expanding the assumption of costs through statutory health insurance beyond today’s regulations.”

This means that in more cases than before, the costs of the intervention, usually between 500 and 800 euros, should be paid by the health insurance company. So far, this is only the case if pregnancy is a danger to the woman or it has become pregnant by rape. For women who cannot afford the demolition financially because they earn less than 1500 euros net per month, the health insurance company, which will then receive the money from the state.

If a woman decides to do not want to carry out pregnancy for other reasons, she bears the costs for this. This is because this intervention is not punished according to the current legal situation, but is nevertheless illegal-a regulation that has been found in German law since the 1990s with the declared goal of protecting unborn life. The health insurance companies, financed from the contributions of all insured persons, cannot use their funds to finance an illegal intervention.

So far, they are puzzling at the health insurance companies, which could mean the expansion. “In principle, it would be possible that the legislator obliges the SHI to cover the costs of the abortion,” said a spokeswoman for the GKV-Spitzenverband the star. However, the legal framework should be taken into account.

The SPD interprets the sentence, similar to the lawyer Brosius-Gersdorf, namely that the goal from the coalition agreement requires a change in the legal situation to terminate the pregnancy, more precisely: the abolition of criminal law paragraph 218, for which many in the SPD have already been used in the past legislative period.

However, this is not in the coalition agreement, at least if you look at the exact wording. After all, an extended cost of costs does not automatically mean that all abortions will be paid in the future. Technically, the sentence would also be fulfilled, for example, if the income limit for those who are financed would be financed would be put up and thus covered the costs for more women in the future.

However, the situation is not very clear. If only because Chancellor Friedrich Merz did not quite certainly showed the effects of the implementation of the coalition agreement in the case of a demand at the summer press conference. “I cannot conclusively assess what legal consequences this has, possibly also on the paragraph 218 Criminal Code”. But his guess is, “we won’t change anything about it.”

Others in his faction are clearer. For many in the Union, the abolition of paragraph 218 is a red cloth – unimaginable that they would have engaged in a wording in the coalition agreement that would provide for this. “A change in paragraph 218 has not been agreed and would be in clear contradiction to the state’s obligation to protect against the unborn and the case law of the Federal Constitutional Court,” said legal politician Elisabeth Winkelmeier-Becker of the “Welt”. The wording only means the improvement in financial support for needy women.

However, the SPD should continue to understand the wording as a lever to request the legalization of the termination of pregnancy. In the coalition agreement, “the assumption of costs by the statutory health insurance was also firmly agreed,” said the deputy parliamentary group leader Sonja Eichwede “Table.briefings”. “As legislators, we now have to create all the necessary conditions.”

At the government level, you are being buttoned up. The Ministry of Justice, SPD-led, refers to the request of the star on the CDU-led Ministry of Health. There it says: The coalition agreement is “guideline” for the reform projects of the federal government. The consultations about the point mentioned are “not yet complete within the federal government”.