Ecuador: Draconian Abortion Laws

Care2.com reported that Ecuador’s draconian abortion laws put the lives of rape survivors at risk, according to a Human Rights Watch report issued this week.

As the law stands in the South American country, a woman can only obtain an abortion if she is deemed to be “an idiot or demented,” or if the health or life of the woman is at risk, regardless of how she got pregnant. Otherwise, women and girls have no access to a legal abortion. In fact, it’s a crime both for a woman to seek and abortion and for a doctor to provide one.
According to Human Rights Watch:
The criminal code imposes penalties including prison terms ranging from one to five years for women and girls who obtain abortions. Medical professionals who provide them are subject to harsher penalties. These penalties drive some women and girls to have illegal and unsafe abortions, thwarting Ecuador’s efforts to reduce maternal mortality and injury.Ecuador has a relatively high maternal mortality rate, with 110 deaths per 100,000 births according to data from 2010. For comparison, the United States has 21 deaths per 100,000 births. Read Article
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