Latin America is home to some of the most restrictive abortion laws in the world. While only three countries—Chile, El Salvador, and the Dominican Republic—provide no exceptions or extenuating circumstances for the criminal sanctions on abortion, in most countries and jurisdictions, exceptions are provided only when necessary to save the pregnant woman’s life and in certain other narrowly defined circumstances. Even where abortion is not punished by law, women often have severely limited access because of lack of proper regulation and political will.
Advancing access to safe and legal abortion can save women’s lives and facilitate women’s equality. Women’s decisions about abortion are not just about their bodies in the abstract, but rather about their human rights relating to personhood, dignity, and privacy more broadly. Continuing barriers to such decisions in Latin America interfere with women’s enjoyment of their rights, and fuel clandestine and unsafe practices, a major cause of maternal mortality in much of the region.
Latin American women’s organizations have fought for the right to safe and legal abortion for decades. Increasingly, international human rights law supports their claims. In fact, international human rights legal instruments and interpretations of those instruments by authoritative U.N. expert bodies compel the conclusion that access to safe and legal abortion services is integral to the fulfillment of women’s human rights generally, including their reproductive rights and rights relating to their full and equal personhood.
This paper offers (1) a brief overview of the status of abortion legislation in Latin America and (2) an in-depth analysis of international human rights law in this area. In addition to citing international treaty texts, it draws heavily from the work of United Nations treaty monitoring bodies.1 Human Rights Watch hopes that this distillation of international law will support the efforts of women’s rights activists in Latin America
this sux women should be able to make their own decision on what to do with their child
2 comments:
I belive step should be taken not only to provide abortion to thease women, but make it open to more than just die hard cases. Some of thease countries live way below the poverty level. The child would have a horrible life, and just create more problems for the mother becase she now has to feed two people.
I agree, that it will be a hassle for the mother if she had another mouth to feed in the household. She probably doesn't have good health and if she dies what happens to the kids. I think if they provide abortion then it would give both the fetus and the mother an easier time.
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