Zimbabwe's current abortion law, the Termination of Pregnancy Act, was enacted by Rhodesia's white minority government in 1977.
[4][5][6][7] This principle was clarified in the 1938 case Rex v. Bourne, in which Justice Malcolm Macnaghten ruled that abortion could be legally performed to save the mother's life.
[7][8][9] In July 1976, the government's Commission of Inquiry into the Termination of Pregnancy in Rhodesia published its recommendations that some restrictions on abortion be loosened.
"[9] In the journal Zambezia, Diana Seager, a sociology lecturer at the University of Rhodesia, expressed dissatisfaction with the commission's finding, writing that while they made a "seemingly liberal gesture... in substance [their] recommendations are no different from previous legislation.
Roy Buckle, a Salisbury resident, argued that expanded access to legal abortion represented the "thin end of the wedge and that further liberalization will follow.
[10] Other calls to expand access to legal abortion came from the organization Zimbabwe Doctors for Human Rights, as well as former Minister of Finance Tendai Biti.
In accordance with the Termination of Pregnancy Act, an abortion may be legally performed if the pregnancy seriously endangers the mother's life or threatens to permanently impair her physical health, if there is a significant risk that the child would be born with serious physical or mental defects, or if the fetus was conceived as a result unlawful intercourse, defined as rape, incest, or intercourse with a mentally handicapped woman (other sexual offenses, like statutory rape, are not legal grounds for an abortion).
[3][6][13] An abortion may only be performed by a medical practitioner in an institution designated by the Ministry of Health and Child Care, with the written permission of the hospital superintendent or administrator.
Under section 60 of the Criminal Law and Codification Reform Act, illegal abortion is punishable by up to five years in prison and/or a fine not exceeding level 10.
[15] In 2017, Ministry of Health and Child Care official Dr. Bernard Madzima estimated that illegal abortions causes 16% of maternal deaths, half of whom were adolescents.