Sisters Overseas Service (SOS) was a New Zealand organisation that helped women travel to Australia to obtain abortions in the 1970s and early 1980s.
[3] SOS provided counselling and support and made arrangements for women to travel to Australian clinics for safe, legal abortions.
[4] The local organiser was Leigh Minnitt, and she, Dr Carol Shand, Wendy Norman and a lawyer administered a trust which received donations from people wanting to help women “left in the lurch”.
[7] Margaret Sparrow and Leigh Minnitt organised telephone volunteers, billets for women requiring accommodation before flying to Australia, transport, flights, funds and phone calls to Australian clinics.
In June 1980 there were branches in the following places: Auckland, Christchurch, Dunedin, Gisborne, Hamilton, Invercargill, Blenheim, Naper/Hastings, Nelson, New Plymouth, Palmerston North, Rotorua, Taupo, Tauranga, Whakatane, Wellington.
[2] The events in the life of the main character in Sue Orr's novel Loop Tracks (2021) were inspired by a friend who had used SOS in the late 1970s.