LEGISLATION Every year, at least 70,000 women die from complications related to unsafe abortions. It is further estimated that unsafe abortions account for 13% of all maternal deaths worldwide and, in some countries, it accounts for 60% of maternal deaths. Research indicates that there is a strong correlation between abortion legality and abortion safety, and thus women living in countries with restrictive abortion laws often resort to unsafe, clandestine abortions, jeopardizing their lives and health. As unsafe abortions are increasingly being considered a major public health problem, human rights advocacy for abortion has gained greater momentum. The rise in international standards for reproductive rights has led to the establishment of
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At that moment, Salvadoran law allowed abortion when the life of the mother was at risk, the pregnancy was the result of rape or incest, or the fetus had suffered a grave malformation. In 1995, the postwar legislature began drafting a new criminal code modeled largely on Spanish law; encouraging the expansion of abortion rights (Hipsher 2001) . When these proposed expansions became public, the pro-life movement launched a powerful public outcry. The ARENA party retorted by drafting a new bill that criminalized abortion all circumstances. This alternative legislation quickly gained public support and despite the FMLN party uniformly voting in favor of liberalization, they did not have sufficient votes to carry the decision. This resulted in the total abortion ban being passed in 1997. Building on the momentum from the highly publicized legislative victory, the ARENA party proposed a constitutional amendment to protect life “from the very moment of conception.” The FMLN stood against this amendment in the first vote, but did not have sufficient representation to prevent it from passing to a second round. The pro-life campaign had aggressively argued that there was no situation in which medical science could not save the life of a pregnant woman and also try to save the life of the embryo inside her, thus solidifying the ban on abortions.
Chapter II of the reformed Penal Code, which deals with Crimes Against the Life of Human Beings in the First Stages of Development, penalizes:
• women who induce their own abortions or give their consent to someone else to induce an abortion
• persons who induce an abortion without a woman’s consent or who obtain consent through violence or
At that moment, Salvadoran law allowed abortion when the life of the mother was at risk, the pregnancy was the result of rape or incest, or the fetus had suffered a grave malformation. In 1995, the postwar legislature began drafting a new criminal code modeled largely on Spanish law; encouraging the expansion of abortion rights (Hipsher 2001) . When these proposed expansions became public, the pro-life movement launched a powerful public outcry. The ARENA party retorted by drafting a new bill that criminalized abortion all circumstances. This alternative legislation quickly gained public support and despite the FMLN party uniformly voting in favor of liberalization, they did not have sufficient votes to carry the decision. This resulted in the total abortion ban being passed in 1997. Building on the momentum from the highly publicized legislative victory, the ARENA party proposed a constitutional amendment to protect life “from the very moment of conception.” The FMLN stood against this amendment in the first vote, but did not have sufficient representation to prevent it from passing to a second round. The pro-life campaign had aggressively argued that there was no situation in which medical science could not save the life of a pregnant woman and also try to save the life of the embryo inside her, thus solidifying the ban on abortions.
Chapter II of the reformed Penal Code, which deals with Crimes Against the Life of Human Beings in the First Stages of Development, penalizes:
• women who induce their own abortions or give their consent to someone else to induce an abortion
• persons who induce an abortion without a woman’s consent or who obtain consent through violence or