ABSTRACT
During the COVID-19 pandemic, mobility across domestic and international borders to access medical services became a point of contention. However, long before the pandemic, cross-border travel to access abortion services was recognized as a commonplace global phenomenon. Two democratic countries, Canada and Poland, offer an interesting point of comparison. Post-1989, Polish abortion laws became stricter, to the point that abortion is now almost completely illegal in the country, compelling women to travel to Germany, UK, and the Netherlands for abortion services. Before and after the 1969 revisions to abortion laws in Canada, women traveled inside and outside the country due to the restrictive nature of those laws. After the 1969 abortion law was struck down by the Canadian Supreme Court in 1988, women tend to travel from northern, rural, and Eastern Canada, usually to urban centres to access abortion services. For both Canada and Poland, abortion laws, the practice of medicine, and pro-choice activist networks provide interesting points of comparison in relation to larger questions of cross-border mobility.
