Biolaw and the intimate

In France, organ and tissue donation is governed by bioethics laws; the three main principles governing this are free donation, anonymity between donors and recipients, and presumed consent.
The Caillavet Act of 1976 stipulates that all deceased persons are considered by default to be donors unless they previously entered their name in a national opt-out register held by the Biomedicine Agency (ABM) created in 1998. Law no. 2016-41 of 26 January 2016 on the modernisation of the French health system, which came into force on 1 January 2017, confirms the terms of the Caillavet Act of 1976. All French people are presumed donors unless they express their opposition to organ removal during life, as set out in Decree no. 2016-1118 of 11 August 2016 on the terms for opting out of organ removal after death. This opposition may be expressed by entry in the national opt-out register. Individuals may also express their wishes to opt out in a written document entrusted to a friend or relative, or even by informing their friends or relatives verbally of such wishes. Individuals may be entered on the register from the age of 13, and they may decide to withdraw their decision to opt out at any time.

References:
. Law no. 2016-41 of 26 January 2016 on the modernisation of the French health system;
. Decree of 16 August 2016 approving the rules of good practice for interviewing family members in the area of organ and tissue removal;
. National Organ Donation Site.

D 18 January 2017    AAnne-Laure Zwilling

In 2024, a law enshrined in the 1958 Constitution (art. 34) the freedom of women to have access to voluntary interruption of pregnancy (IVG). The bill, presented to the Council of Ministers on 12 December 2023, was passed by the deputies on 30 January 2024 without amendment, then adopted by the Senate on 28 February 2024.
The sole article of the bill amends article 34 of the 1958 Constitution to state that "the law determines the conditions in which the freedom guaranteed to women to have recourse to a voluntary interruption of pregnancy is exercised".
In France, abortion had been decriminalised and regulated since the Veil law of 17 January 197->https://www.vie-publique.fr/node/272779]5, reinforced by the abortion law of December 1979. The right to abortion has subsequently been strengthened by a number of texts: the offence of obstructing an abortion created in 1993, the 2013 social security funding law allowing free abortions, a 2014 law removing the reference to a "situation of distress", the law of 20 March 2017 which extended the offence of obstructing an abortion, and finally the law of 2 March 2022 which extended the legal waiting period from 12 to 14 weeks.

D 2 April 2024    AAnne-Laure Zwilling