Canada Province Quebec Begins Abortion Reimbursement Payments 
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by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
February 25, 2007
Montreal, Canada (LifeNews.com) — The government of the Canadian province of Quebec has begun paying for the abortions of more than 45,000 women with taxpayer funds after a judge forced the province in August to reimburse women who had abortions at private abortion facilities.
Previously, Quebec paid for abortions done at public hospitals but only a portion of the cost for private abortions.
The ruling makes Quebec spend $13 million on the abortions done at private abortion facilities there since 1999. The province could pay as much as $300 per abortion for the thousands of women affected by its policy.
Quebec Superior Court Justice Nicole Benard ruled in his decision last year that the women should not have been forced to pay for the abortions even though they got them at private abortion businesses rather than public facilities. That’s because the Quebec Health Insurance Act entitles women getting abortions to public funding of them.
The Quebec government ran advertisements in newspapers over the weekend telling women who may be eligible for the abortion funding reimbursements how to apply.
Women can submit requests for reimbursements by September 7 and government checks will be sent out to eligible recipients beginning February 8, 2008, according to the CanWest News service.
The pro-abortion Association for Access to Abortion, which provides funding for women to get abortions, filed the class action lawsuit against the provincial government covering all abortions done on women in the first 13 weeks of pregnancy.
