Ricerc@Sapienza

Starting from the second half of the Nineteenth century, the Catholic doctrine was confronted with the practices of birth control and biopolitical intervention on the reproduction. In this perspective, the Congregation of the Holy Office – the guardian of the orthodoxy of the Catholic discourse – discussed questions such as therapeutic abortion, obstetrical practices, contraception, and artificial insemination. The inquisitors acquired knowledge on the practices of controlling human reproduction, and defined norms had power of law for Catholic discourse.

The authors take stock ofa 2018 report to the ltalian Parliament by the ltalian Ministry ofHealth, highlighting how hard it stili is for ltaly to guarantee access to abortion services 40 years after the enactment of law n. 194/78. Despite constantly declining abortion rates, use of emergency contraception methods is on the rise, which leads to endometrial alterations and prevent the fertilized embryo from lodging into the matemal~womb, resulting in the forrner 's destruction.