Decree 770

The Decree 770 was a social experiment that was initiated in October 1966 by the Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceauşescu. The aim was to increase the number of Romanian population and encourage the emergence of a new generation within the meaning of communism. To this end all methods of contraception and abortion were banned. Women of childbearing potential were systematically monitored in order to detect potential life early on.

Women should take an average of four children into the world and grow the Romanian population within 24 years to 10 million people. The program was accompanied by massive financial support for kindergartens and schools. Only women who were over 40 years old or already had four children, abortions were granted. Later, the restriction has been increased to 45 years and 5 children. Nevertheless, many affected women was a refusal, and there has often been illegal abortions, for which an illegal network was created. Official statistics speak of more than 11,000 women who lost their lives performed by amateurs abortion attempts. Abortionist doctors and women were interrogated in part and were given long prison sentences. Many women who came to the hospital because of complications, were still being interrogated on the operating table, some medical assistance was refused. The decree led to an artificial population growth of two million people who would not have been born without this arrangement. They were under the term Decreţei known ( German Decree children, Transylvanian - Saxon decree cell ).

However, despite the initial financial support for the program, the associated social policies proven over the years to be insufficient. As a result of the illegal and improperly performed abortion attempts also occurred frequently on births of children with disabilities. These were then in social orphanages such as the children's home Cighid near the town of Oradea deported, where in addition to disabled children among other unwanted children were admitted. Here the Irecuperabili (Romanian for the irretrievable ) were kept under degrading conditions. Even before the Romanian Revolution of 1989 was the phenomenon of street children in Romania. Resulting from the decree of social problems in Romania are still great today.