Apathy rules: Most Canadians clueless about Canadian abortion law

Well here is a surprise. It turns out about two-thirds of Canadians do not know what the abortion law is in Canada; namely that there is no abortion law in Canada. From the National Post:

The poll, which asked 1,022 Canadian adults about their understanding of the country’s abortion regulations, found that just 22% of Canadians correctly identified a woman’s right to an abortion with no governmental restrictions. Canada has not had legislated abortion rules since 1988, making the country an “absolute outlier” on the issue, according to a medical ethicist.

“There’s really only a very small number of Canadians that correctly identify the current situation in Canada,” says pollster Jaideep Mukerji, who worked on the Angus-Reid poll, which was released on Tuesday. “That could be problematic.”

“Once you explain to them what the actual law is, there’s only 27% of Canadians that say that the status quo [of no law] should be maintained. There’s a majority of Canadians that would like to make some change to that status quo,” Mr. Mukerji said.