Row brews over Italian abortion proposals

Ultra-Catholic politicians in Italy have clashed with men and women across the political spectrum after a member of Silvio Berlusconi's Forza Italia party suggested the country's cash strapped health service could save money by allowing women only one free abortion, after which they should be made to pay.

Senator Antonio Gentile's proposal was initially regarded as outlandish and unlikely to gain ground. But then the health minister, Girolamo Sirchia, told the country's biggest selling daily paper, Corriere della Sera, that “abortion is, in substance, murder” and suggested that …