President Barack Obama

President Obama has made the decision to terminate a ban on providing funding for organizations that provide abortion services overseas, thus reversing a policy enacted by the previous administration of George W. Bush. This is one of a number of executive orders being issued by Barack Obama that reverses policies of the previous president.

The policy of George W. Bush, referred to as the “global gag rule,” prevented organizations that provide relief in foreign countries from being recipients of U.S. funding if they were connected in any way in the support or provision of abortion services. Non-profit health organizations have indicated they have incurred severe financial distress, as the U.S. government is one of the primary funders of family planning programs on a global scale. President Barack Obama’s decision will be received as welcome news by these organizations.

With hundreds of groups functioning in many of the world’s poorest countries, where both infant and maternal mortality rates are very high, they have had to make a difficult choice. They could agree to sign the gag rule of the Bush administration, agreeing to be silent on abortion, or refuse to sign and be deprived of significant amounts of financial aid from the United States. President Obama will now remove the “global gag rule,” allowing funding to be directed to those organizations that had refused to obey the policy of the Bush administration. Barack Obama is demonstrating in his first days as 44^th U.S. president that he intends to chart a course much different from that of his predecessor.