Drugs that induce abortions in the first ten weeks of pregnancy are due to be approved for use in Japan, but they would only be prescribed with the consent of the woman’s spouse.

The legislation is winding its way through Japan’s parliament after British pharmaceutical company Linepharma International applied last year to market a combination of two drugs for the purposes of abortion. A decision is expected before the end of the year.

Women’s rights groups have criticised the legislation as it requires the woman’s partner to agree to the abortion – under the same rules that apply to surgical abortion.

Questioned by a parliamentary committee earlier this month, a health ministry bureaucrat stated that the standards required for a surgical abortion under the 1948 Maternal Protection Law should also apply to chemical abortions.

“In principle, we believe that spousal consent is necessary, even if an abortion is induced by an oral medication,” said Yasuhiro Hashimoto, the head of the ministry’s child and family policy bureau.

Around 145,000 surgical abortions were carried out in Japan in 2020, which is one of only 11 nations that still require the consent of the woman’s husband for the procedure to go ahead.