Savita Halappanavar was an Indian dentist , who moved to Ireland in 2008. Her family hailed from Belgaum Karnataka. She died at University College Hospital Galway Ireland on 28 October 2012 after having suffered a miscarriage when she was 17 weeks pregnant and denied abortion under Irish law which led to septicemia (blood poisoning), multiple organ failure and her death.
Her husband, Praveen Halappanavar (34), an engineer at Boston Scientific in Galway, says she asked several times over a three-day period that the pregnancy be terminated. He says that, having been told she was miscarrying, and after one day in severe pain, Ms Halappanavar asked for a medical termination.
“Savita was really in agony. She was very upset, but she accepted she was losing the baby,” he told The Irish Times. “When the consultant came on the ward rounds on Monday morning, Savita asked: `If they could not save the baby, could they induce to end the pregnancy?’ The consultant said: `As long as there is a fetal heartbeat, we can’t do anything.”‘
“Again on Tuesday morning … the consultant said it was the law, that this is a Catholic country. Savita said: “I am neither Irish nor Catholic,” but they said there was nothing they could do,” Praveen Halappanavar was quoted as saying.
He said his wife vomited repeatedly and collapsed in a restroom that night, but doctors wouldn’t terminate the fetus because its heart was still beating.
She spent a further 2½ days “in agony†until the foetal heartbeat stopped.
The fetus died the following day and its remains were surgically removed. Within hours, Praveen Halappanavar said, his wife was placed under sedation in intensive care with systemic blood poisoning and he was never able to speak with her again. By Saturday her heart, kidneys and liver had stopped working and she was pronounced dead early Sunday, Oct. 28.
Her death led to protests by local community, and Indian community in particular. On November 14, 2012, more than 2,000 people gathered to protest Ireland’s abortion laws outside Leinster House in Savita’s memory.
There was pressure on Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny to order an external inquiry on the circumstances under which Savita Halappanavar’s life could not be saved.
There is also lot of pressure to amend the law, as the present legislation is based on a 1861 bill, when Ireland was part of the United Kingdom, which declares it is illegal to “procure a miscarriage”
Praveen Halappanavar said he took his wife’s remains back to India for a Hindu funeral and cremation Nov. 3. News of the circumstances that led to her death emerged Tuesday in Galway after the Indian community canceled the city’s annual Diwali festival. Savita Halappanavar, a dentist, had been one of the festival’s main organizers.