Abortion in Belgium was fully legalized on April 4, 1990. Abortion is legal until the twelfth week of pregnancy, and it is required for women to have six days of counseling prior to the abortion and to check in with her doctor to monitor her health in the weeks after the procedure. Later abortions are permitted if the survival of the woman or fetus will be negatively impacted, leading to serious harm or death.

At the time the new abortion law was controversial to many Belgians, and King Baudouin I, a devout Catholic

Catholic

The word catholic comes from the Greek phrase , meaning "on the whole," "according to the whole" or "in general", and is a combination of the Greek words meaning "about" and meaning "whole"...

, refused to sign it (he was temporarily suspended from governing the country for a few days, with the acting government signing approval in his absence).