We did it! The Eight amendment has been repealed!
It's official!
Ireland has voted overwhelmingly in favour of repealing the Eighth Amendment with the final count coming in a 66.4% Yes, 33.6% No.
Crowds flocked tot he grounds of Dublin Castle to hear the final result, which was revealed at just after 6pm on Saturday evening.
A strong turnout saw over 3 million voters take to the polls across 40 constituencies.
Official counting got underway at 9am this morning, with early tallies mirroring the results of two landslide exit polls that predicted a victory for the 'Yes' side by a margin of roughly 69%-31%.
The government will now be able to legislate for abortion without restriction up to 12 weeks, with Taoiseach Leo Varadkar saying he hopes a bill will be passed within six months.
At the time of writing, the Irish Times reports that the Yes vote stands at 67.3 percent.
The first constituency to report a Yes vote was Galway East, with 60.2 percent choosing to repeal the Eighth Amendment.
Dublin saw an especially strong Yes turnout. Among the highest Yes vote counts in the county were Dublin Bay South, with 78.49 percent voting to repeal and Dún Laoghaire with 77.06 percent casting Yes votes.
The government will now be able to legislate for abortion without restriction up to 12 weeks, with Taoiseach Leo Varadkar saying he hopes a bill will be passed within six months.
"What we have seen today is the culmination of a quiet revolution that has been taking place in Ireland for the past 10 or 20 years," the Taoiseach said, according to the Irish Times.
He also declared to RTÉ, "We will have a modern Constitution for a modern country."
The Taoiseach emphasised the importance of the people who spoke out during the campaign.
“Most of all and above all, it was the very many brave women and men who told their personal stories as to how the Eighth Amendment impacted on them, and impacted on them adversely," he said.
Dr Rhona Mahony, Master of the National Maternity Hospital, said on RTÉ’s Marian Finucane Show that it's quite significant that doctors can now care for their female patients with crisis pregnancies here in Ireland.
“It’s a very emotional day. It’s all about real life and the dilemma faced by Irish women every day," she imparted.
