Decree 770
The Decree 770 was a social experiment in October 1966 by the Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu was initiated. The aim was to increase the number of the Romanian population and to let a new generation grow up in the spirit of communism . To this end, all contraceptive methods and abortion were banned. Women of childbearing potential were systematically monitored in order to be able to detect potential life at an early stage.
On average, women should have four children and the Romanian population should grow by ten million people within 24 years. The program was accompanied by massive financial support for kindergartens and schools. Abortions were only granted to women over the age of 40 or who had four children. The limit was later increased to 45 years or five children. Nonetheless, many of the women affected developed a refusal to attend and illegal abortions were frequent , for which an illegal network was created. Official statistics speak of more than 11,000 women who lost their lives to attempted abortion by amateurs. Doctors and women who performed abortion were interrogated in some cases and received long prison sentences. Many women who came to hospital because of complications were interrogated on the operating table , and some were refused medical assistance. The decree artificially increased the population by two million people who would not have been born without this arrangement. They were known under the term Decreței ( German decree children , Transylvanian-Saxon decretzell ).
However, despite the initial funding of the program, the accompanying social policies have proven to be inadequate over the years. As a result of the illegal and improperly carried out abortion attempts, there were also frequent births of disabled children. These were then deported to social orphanages such as the Cighid children's home near the city of Oradea , where handicapped children and unwanted children were brought in. Here the Irecuperabili ( Romanian for "the irretrievable") were kept under the most unworthy of conditions. The street children phenomenon existed in Romania even before the Romanian Revolution in 1989 . The social problems in Romania resulting from the decree are still great today.
Web links
- Evenimentul Zilei, Sandra Scarlat: "Decreteii": produsele unei epoci care a imbolnavit Romania . hotnews.ro, May 17, 2005 ( German offspring of a decree: products of an era that made Romania sick )
literature
- Gail Kligman: The Politics of Duplicity. Controlling Reproduction in Ceausescu's Romania. Univ. of California Press, 1998 ( google books )