There is no legally binding international treaty that establishes abortion as a human right. Yet governments around the world are increasingly told they are violating international law if they refuse to legalize or expand abortion. How did a right that nations never negotiated become one that international institutions now claim governments are obligated to uphold?
The answer lies in a deliberate, decadeslong campaign to transform abortion from a contested moral and political question into an alleged human right. Through ideologically driven multilateral agencies, nongovernmental organizations, academic institutions, and allied scholars, abortion has been steadily reframed: first as “safe, legal, and rare,” then as a matter of “reproductive rights,” later as part of “sexual and reproductive health and rights,” and now as an alleged human right protected under international law.
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I have witnessed this campaign firsthand. As Regional Coordinator for the Institute for Women’s Health based in Guatemala, I have seen international institutions increasingly pressure Latin American countries to liberalize their abortion laws through advisory opinions and strategically selected legal cases. The recent “Beatriz” case against El Salvador is among the clearest examples of this effort to use international human rights mechanisms to reshape domestic abortion policy.
This strategy extends far beyond the Americas. United Nations treaty bodies and the World Health Organization have become principal vehicles for advancing the claim that abortion is a human right. They increasingly characterize restrictions on abortion as violations of “reproductive rights” and urge governments to amend their domestic laws accordingly.
Yet no legally binding international treaty defines “reproductive rights,” much less establishes a right to abortion. Instead, these concepts are advanced through nonbinding interpretations issued by U.N. committees, WHO guidance, and international declarations that gradually make their way into academic literature, NGO advocacy, diplomatic negotiations, and eventually public discourse. Repetition creates the appearance of consensus, even where no legal consensus exists.
The WHO has gone even further. During the COVID-19 pandemic, it classified abortion as an essential health service that countries should continue providing even as health systems struggled to meet genuine emergency needs. More recently, it issued abortion guidelines calling for the removal of many long-standing legal safeguards, including gestational age limits, mandatory waiting periods, third-party authorization requirements, and restrictions on who may perform abortions.
Abortion remains one of the world’s most morally, religiously, and culturally contested issues. Most nations do not recognize abortion on demand throughout pregnancy, nor have they agreed that abortion constitutes a human right under international law. Nevertheless, international institutions continue advancing precisely that claim.
The implications extend well beyond abortion policy. If abortion were successfully established as an international human right, domestic abortion laws would increasingly be shaped not by elected legislatures or the democratic will of citizens, but by international courts, treaty-monitoring bodies, and unelected bureaucracies. Governments could face sustained diplomatic pressure to legalize, fund, and expand abortion services regardless of the convictions of their people or the text of the treaties they have actually ratified.
The consequences would also reach individuals. Physicians, nurses, and other healthcare professionals increasingly face pressure to violate deeply held moral and religious convictions. This is not a hypothetical concern. The WHO’s abortion guideline advises governments to limit conscientious objection when it is viewed as an obstacle to abortion access and suggests that broad protections for conscience may be difficult to justify.
Other fundamental freedoms would also be placed at risk. Parents could see their authority over their children’s education diminished as schools are encouraged to present abortion as a protected human right rather than a matter of profound moral disagreement. Religious liberty and freedom of speech likewise become vulnerable when opposition to abortion is recast as opposition to human rights. A genuine human right protects individuals from coercion. A purported “right” that requires governments, medical professionals, taxpayers, parents, and religious believers to participate in or facilitate conduct they consider morally wrong does precisely the opposite.
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Fortunately, nations are not without an alternative vision. The Geneva Consensus Declaration, first signed in 2020 and now supported by 41 countries, affirms a principle grounded in existing international law: there is no international right to abortion, and every sovereign nation retains the authority to determine its own laws and policies. Any changes to abortion policy, the declaration recognizes, should occur through each nation’s own democratic and legislative processes — not through reinterpretations imposed by international institutions.
The campaign to manufacture a human right to abortion is not about expanding freedom or protecting women’s health. It is an effort to redefine international law in ways that erode national sovereignty and fundamental liberties. The Institute for Women’s Health will continue working alongside Geneva Consensus Declaration member nations to advance women’s health while respecting every country’s sovereign right to chart its own course. Women deserve better health outcomes, and nations deserve genuine partnership — not political coercion disguised as human rights.
Geraldine Veiman, M.D., serves as regional coordinator in Guatemala for the Institute for Women’s Health. She is a physician specializing in bioethics and epidemiological research.
