Talk:Abortion in Malawi

Abortion in Malawi has been listed as one of the Social sciences and society good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can reassess it.
Review: July 14, 2025. (Reviewed version).

This article is written in Malawian English and some terms that are used in it may be different or absent from other varieties of English. According to the relevant style guide, this should not be changed without broad consensus.

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A fact from Abortion in Malawi appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 10 August 2024 (check views). The text of the entry was as follows:

Did you know... that some abortions in Malawi are performed by traditional healers?

A record of the entry may be seen at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2024/August. The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/Abortion in Malawi.

Wikipedia

Did you know nomination

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Hey man im josh talk 13:41, 1 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

(

Comment or view
Article history

)

... that some abortions in Malawi are performed by traditional healers?

Source: [1] Malawian women most commonly seek abortion services from private clinics or traditional healers, or attempt to self-induce abortion using unsafe methods.

Reviewed: Template:Did you know nominations/Titiou Lecoq

Created by Vigilantcosmicpenguin (talk). Number of QPQs required: 1. Nominator has 6 past nominations.

— Vigilant Cosmic Penguin 🐧 (talk | contribs) 05:16, 30 July 2024 (UTC).[reply]

Looks good to me. The hook is verified and I'm not seeing anything to be concerned about (the article has good length, cites reliable sources, etc). Note that this is my first DYK review so please ping me if there are any issues! Clovermoss🍀 (talk) 03:24, 31 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

GA review

PASSED

Issues with clarity, layout and scope have all been addressed, bringing this article up to GA criteria. --Grnrchst (talk) 22:56, 14 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

This review is transcluded from Talk:Abortion in Malawi/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Nominator: Vigilantcosmicpenguin (talk · contribs) 18:31, 29 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Reviewer: Grnrchst (talk · contribs) 09:58, 9 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Good to see another article on abortion from vigilantcosmicpenguin. I'm looking forward to reading this and learning more about the subject. --Grnrchst (talk) 09:58, 9 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

Legislation

Spotcheck: [1] Verified.
Ending the quote "anyone who supplies commodities" without explanation could be confusing. It'd be worth explicitly elaborating what these "commodities" are exactly.
- Rephreased. — Vigilant Cosmic Penguin 🐧 (talk | contribs) 04:01, 12 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Spotcheck: [2] Verified.
"Malawi's abortion law is one of the strictest in the world" According to whom?
- Removed this statement; in hindsight, I think it's undue. — Vigilant Cosmic Penguin 🐧 (talk | contribs) 04:01, 12 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Spotcheck: [3] Verified.
Spotcheck: [4] Verified.
Spotcheck: [5] Verified.
"medical standards who can provide" Should this be "medical standards for who can provide"?
- Fixed. — Vigilant Cosmic Penguin 🐧 (talk | contribs) 04:01, 12 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

History

Spotcheck: [7] Verified.
"[...] Policy 2009 calls for access [...]" should this be "called"?
- Fixed. — Vigilant Cosmic Penguin 🐧 (talk | contribs) 04:01, 12 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Hrm, it seems this first section is bouncing back and forth in the timeline quite a bit. It would be more easily readable if it kept to a stricter chronology, unless there is a specific reason to break with it.
- Reorganized. Still not 100% chronological, but I think this is the best order. — Vigilant Cosmic Penguin 🐧 (talk | contribs) 04:01, 12 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Spotcheck: [8] Verified.
"as it violated Islamic teachings" according to his own interpretation, no?
- Rephrased. — Vigilant Cosmic Penguin 🐧 (talk | contribs) 04:01, 12 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Spotcheck: [10] Verified.

Termination of Pregnancy Bill

Seems like we're introducing the contents of the bill before providing the context for it. So we say what the bill is, then go into the background, then go to the bill first being proposed. It'd be more readable, I think, if we discuss the contents of the bill after it is first proposed.
- I had intended the first paragraph of the section to summarize the bill, then to go into it's history, but now I think you're right that it should be more chronological. Reorganized. — Vigilant Cosmic Penguin 🐧 (talk | contribs) 04:01, 12 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
"which reported recommending" -> "which recommended"?
- Rephrased to which wrote a report recommending. — Vigilant Cosmic Penguin 🐧 (talk | contribs) 04:01, 12 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Spotcheck: [12] Verified.
"but could not secure support after most of the parliament lost their seats." Not sure what's meant by this.
- Rewritten. — Vigilant Cosmic Penguin 🐧 (talk | contribs) 04:01, 12 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Spotcheck: [13] Verified.
"In January 2017, Donald Trump" I know it's obvious, but we should introduce him as "United States president Donald Trump".
- Done, it's important context. — Vigilant Cosmic Penguin 🐧 (talk | contribs) 04:01, 12 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
This paragraph about US funding could do with a bit of a rewrite, so each sentence leads into the next one. Right now it's a bit "X happened. Y happened. Z happened." where it could be "X led to Y. This resulted in Z".
- Tweaked. — Vigilant Cosmic Penguin 🐧 (talk | contribs) 04:01, 12 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
"The Mexico City policy was rescinded in 2021" I'm guessing by the Biden administration, but this could be clarified.
- Done. — Vigilant Cosmic Penguin 🐧 (talk | contribs) 04:01, 12 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Do we have any updates on this since 2021?
- Expanded from some sources from the past year. (Turns out some stuff has happened, so you should probably give the section another full readthrough.) — Vigilant Cosmic Penguin 🐧 (talk | contribs) 04:01, 12 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Debate about the Termination of Pregnancy Bill

I think this subsection could be better integrated into the preceding section, so as to give more immediate context as to why the bill faced such a struggle. The Termination of Pregnancy Bill section could then be broken up into more subsections to demarcate the context, proposal, debate and opposition, and later attempts.
- Reorganized. — Vigilant Cosmic Penguin 🐧 (talk | contribs) 04:01, 12 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Vigilantcosmicpenguin: Can you break it up into subsections? The new reorganised section is good, but it's very long. --Grnrchst (talk) 10:15, 14 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Grnrchst: Done. — Vigilant Cosmic Penguin 🐧 (talk | contribs) 18:21, 14 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
"Religious groups have pressured the parliament not to approve the bill" If we go on to say that some religious groups supported the bill, then it should be clarified here that it is only a subsection of religious groups that pressured parliament not to approve it.
Spotcheck: [14] Verified.
Some of this uses present tense, is this ongoing?
- Sources as recent as 2024 imply that the debate about the bill continues. — Vigilant Cosmic Penguin 🐧 (talk | contribs) 04:01, 12 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
"claiming this [bill] is a Western thing" Closing quotation marks needed at the end here.
- Fixed. — Vigilant Cosmic Penguin 🐧 (talk | contribs) 04:01, 12 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Prevalence

Spotcheck: [15] Verified.
Spotcheck: [16] Verified.
"The number of abortions had between 2009 and 2015 despite an increase in contraceptive use" Had what?
- Fixed. — Vigilant Cosmic Penguin 🐧 (talk | contribs) 04:01, 12 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Spotcheck: [17] Verified.
Spotcheck: [19] Verified.
Spotcheck: [21] Verified.
Spotcheck: [25] Verified.
Spotcheck: [28] Verified.
Spotcheck: [29] Verified.

Post-abortion care

Spotcheck: [31] Verified.

Lead

It'd be worth elaborating a bit on the history before the termination of pregnancy bill. A sentence or two should be enough.
- Expanded lead. — Vigilant Cosmic Penguin 🐧 (talk | contribs) 04:01, 12 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Checklist

GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria

Is it well written?
A. The prose is clear and concise, and the spelling and grammar are correct:
~~A couple cases of unclear prose.~~

B. It complies with the manual of style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation:
~~The lead could do with being a bit longer, and some of the sections could be rearranged for readability.~~
Is it verifiable with no original research, as shown by a source spot-check?
A. It contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline:
All references are properly formatted.

B. Reliable sources are cited inline. All content that could reasonably be challenged, except for plot summaries and that which summarizes cited content elsewhere in the article, must be cited no later than the end of the paragraph (or line if the content is not in prose):
All information is sourced to inline citations, and the sources are all clearly reliable.

C. It contains no original research:
All information seems to come from the sources, with no original research or novel interpretation.

D. It contains no copyright violations nor plagiarism:
No clear cases of plagiarism, and earwig only flags clearly attributed quotes.
Is it broad in its coverage?
A. It addresses the main aspects of the topic:
~~All the main aspects of the topic I would expect to be covered have been, although it would be worth looking to see if there have been recent updates on the TOP bill since 2021.~~

B. It stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style):
Very focused, with no divergence or overcontextualisation.
Is it neutral?
It represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial bias, giving due weight to each:
Clearly neutral, presenting the perspectives with due weight and without taking any stance in wikivoice.
Is it stable?
It does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute:
One reversion of a bot edit last year, no major changes since GA nomination.
Is it illustrated, if possible, by images?
A. Images are tagged with their copyright status, and valid non-free use rationales are provided for non-free content:
No images

B. Images are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions:
No images
Overall:
Pass or Fail:
This is a very good article already, and comes close to passing the GA criteria. My main comments are about article structure, as well as some prose issues here and there. Feel free to ping me once the comments have been addressed or if you have any questions. --Grnrchst (talk) 09:58, 9 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Grnrchst: Ok, I think I have addressed everything. Thanks for reviewing two of my African abortion articles! — Vigilant Cosmic Penguin 🐧 (talk | contribs) 04:01, 12 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Ok, all of my comments have been addressed, which has brought the article up to GA criteria. Fantastic work on this article! --Grnrchst (talk) 22:54, 14 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.