Netherlands hospitals will commit abortions up to 24 weeks, instead of 22

Dutch hospitals are expanding late-term abortions on demand so that women can kill their fully-formed babies without traveling out of the country.

(LifeSiteNews) — Dutch hospitals will start to commit abortions on demand up to 24 weeks of pregnancy, up from the previous limit of 22 weeks. While the abortion law in the Netherlands broadly allows abortions up to 24 weeks (defined as the legal age of “viability”), hospitals generally only committed abortions until the 22nd week because babies 22 weeks or older can now often survive with neonatal care. The Dutch newspaper AD reported that the Dutch Society of Obstetrics and Gynecology (NVOG) and hospitals have agreed on a new protocol in which hospitals will commit abortions between 22 and 24 weeks on demand, despite many babies being able to survive outside of the womb at that age.

As Brussels Signal reports, the change was made to prevent women from traveling abroad for an abortion. Between 22 and 24 weeks, the baby is already highly developed, measuring around 30 centimeters in height and 600 grams of weight. The unborn child already has unique fingerprints, a fully formed face, and can respond to sounds, touch, and lights.

While babies born in that time span are still considered very premature, survival rates often exceed 60 percent in developed countries with modern neonatal care. During an abortion at this stage, the unborn child is often killed via a lethal injection. Pro-life groups criticized the decision, saying that the measure expands access to late-term abortions even of healthy babies at a stage where many unborn children are able to survive outside the womb.

The Dutch pro-life organization Schreeuw om leven said in a statement that the move to expand abortion to 24 weeks “is at odds with a hospital’s core mission, which is focused on healing, alleviating suffering, and protecting life.” Arthur Alderliesten, director of Schreeuw om leven, called the development unacceptable. “There isn’t even a medical condition involved,” he said.

“That is why abortion is not a form of care or a routine medical procedure. It involves the killing of new human life. That is why the step being taken now is wrong.

All the more so because there is a high probability that these are viable children, who can therefore continue to live independently outside the womb. The protection of this extremely vulnerable group of tiny human beings is thus fundamentally under threat—and this, of all places, in a hospital.” He said there is a need for a moral debate on the question of abortion in the country and that this change puts medical professionals in a moral dilemma, as performing abortion on viable babies will be incompatible with the moral convictions of many of them.

In 2024, more than 39,000 abortions were committed in the Netherlands. According to the Ministry of Health, 331 of those were committed between 22 and 24 weeks.