Mexican States Adopt Abortion Restrictions In Response To Legalization Of Procedure In Mexico City

Main Category: Abortion
Also Included In: Litigation / Medical Malpractice;  Women's Health / Gynecology
Article Date: 05 Jan 2010 - 4:00 PDT

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In response to a Mexican Supreme Court ruling in August 2008 upholding a Mexico City law permitting abortion during the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, 17 of 32 Mexican states have approved amendments to their constitutions declaring that life begins at conception and granting legal rights to fetuses, the Chicago Tribune reports. Veracruz, which in November 2009 became the most recent state to enact an antiabortion-rights amendment, has called on the federal government to consider adding a similar amendment to the national constitution.

Many of the new laws contain exceptions allowing abortion in cases of rape or if the woman's life is in danger, and they allow judges to send women for counseling instead of jail if they are convicted of having an abortion. Maria Luisa Sanchez, director of GIRE, a Mexican abortion-rights group, said that the measures effectively "treat women as if they are criminals," adding that abortion is "going to be more clandestine than before." Abortion-rights groups have filed legal actions in state courts to thwart the enforcement of the laws.

Abortion-rights opponents say the spate of amendments reflect a popular backlash against the Supreme Court's 2008 ruling. The Roman Catholic Church, the National Action Party of President Felipe Calderon and the center-left Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, back the amendments. Observers say that the PRI -- which lost the presidency in 2000 and has long favored women's rights and a strong separation of church and state -- made a political decision to support the amendments with an eye to elections in 12 Mexican states in 2010. According to Daniel Lund, a pollster and analyst based in Mexico City, the PRI has shifted to a more conservative stance on abortion to head off conservative rivals as state elections approach. PRI's new position has drawn anger from abortion-rights advocates who say party leaders have traded principles for a possible advantage in the next election (Ellingwood, Chicago Tribune, 12/28/09).

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