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Abortion in Nicaragua is completely illegal. Prior to a change in the law, which took effect on 18 November 2006, the law allowed pregnancies to be terminated for "therapeutic" reasons, but this clause is no longer in effect. [1]
The law before November 2006 permitted therapeutic abortion in Nicaragua so long as the woman and three doctors consented to it. The definition of "therapeutic" was not specific but was commonly understood to apply to cases in which the pregnant woman's life is endangered. [2]
The law prior to November 2006 held that anyone who performed an abortion upon a woman without her permission would be subject to a prison term of three to six years. If the woman consented, both she and the person who performed the abortion faced a sentence of one to four years, and if she attempted a self-induced abortion, the term of imprisonment was four to eight years. A person who performed, or attempted to perform, an abortion, and, as a result, caused injury to the pregnant woman would be jailed for four to 10 years, or six to 10 years if it caused her death. [2]
In October 2006, right before the general elections on 5 November 2006, the National Assembly passed a bill further restricting abortion 52–0 (9 abstaining, 29 absent). The European Union and the United Nations had urged for the vote to be delayed until after the presidential elections. The new law outlawed abortion in all circumstances, making Nicaragua the sixth country in the world to do so, after Chile (currently legal in certain circumstances), the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Malta, and Vatican City. The Assembly rejected a proposal which would have increased the penalty for performing an illegal abortion from 10 to 30 years in prison. President Enrique Bolaños supported this measure, but signed the bill into law on 17 November 2006. Pro-choice groups in Nicaragua have criticized the change to the country's abortion law, and one, the Women's Autonomous Movement, were prepared to file an injunction to prevent it from being enacted. [3] [4] [5]
One case of a termination which was permitted under the former exception to Nicaragua's ban upon abortion was that of a nine-year-old girl, known to the media only as "Rosa", who was impregnated as the result of child sexual abuse in 2003.
The child's family, who were living in Costa Rica at the time, returned to Nicaragua after Costa Rican hospital officials had opposed their desire to end the girl's pregnancy. After the family successfully sought an abortion in a private clinic, the Health Minister of Nicaragua, Lucía Salvo, declared that the procedure had constituted a criminal act, and officials threatened to press charges against those involved. However, Attorney General María del Carmen Solórzano stated that the abortion had not violated the law, as it had been performed in the interest of preserving the life of the girl.
Rosa's case drew international attention and prompted intense debate about abortion law within Nicaragua. Archbishop Miguel Obando y Bravo of Managua said that the family and doctors involved in obtaining the abortion had excommunicated themselves from the Roman Catholic Church; bishops in Nicaragua also released an open letter which likened the termination of pregnancy to terrorist bombings. Others called for the country's laws to be liberalized. [6] [7]
An August–September 2006 Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research poll on abortion to save the life of the mother found that 20% of Nicaraguans felt strongly that it should be "legal", 49% felt somewhat that it should be "legal", 18% felt strongly that it should be "illegal", and 10% felt somewhat that it should be "illegal". [8]
A report on the effects was filed by the Human Rights Watch in October 2007. Human Rights Watch reports the deaths of at least eighty Nicaraguan women in the eleven months following the ban. To compile the report, interviews were conducted with health officials, women in need of health services, doctors in public health, doctors in the private healthcare system, and family members of women who died as a result of the ban.
An unintended side effect has been a "chilling" of other forms of obstetrical care for women. The report states, "While no doctors have been prosecuted for the crime of abortion, as far as we know, the mere possibility of facing criminal charges for providing lifesaving health services has had a deadly effect... the Health Ministry does not monitor the full implementation of the protocols, does not systematize complaints received for the delay or denial of care, and so far has not studied the impact of the law on the lives and health of women." The report quotes an obstetrician as saying "since the law was signed, [public hospitals] don't treat any hemorrhaging, not even post-menopausal hemorrhaging."
Nicaragua's Health Ministry officials told Human Rights Watch that they did not have any official documentation of the effects of the blanket ban and no plans for gathering such documentation. Consequently, statements that the ban has not caused women's deaths can not be substantiated. By contrast, the report cites several case histories. News reports put the number of deaths at 82 after the law has been in effect less than a year. [9]
The point of view of Human Rights Watch is that the law intentionally denies women access to health services essential to saving their lives, and is thus inconsistent with Nicaragua's obligations under international human rights law to ensure women's right to life. Their report is called, "Over Their Dead Bodies". [10]
Abortion in Ireland is regulated by the Health Act 2018. Abortion is permitted in Ireland during the first twelve weeks of pregnancy, and later in cases where the pregnant woman's life or health is at risk, or in the cases of a fatal foetal abnormality. Abortion services commenced on 1 January 2019, following its legalisation by the aforementioned Act, which became law on 20 December 2018. Previously, the 8th Constitutional Amendment had given the life of the unborn foetus the same value as that of its mother, but the 36th constitutional amendment, approved by referendum in May 2018, replaced this with a clause permitting the Oireachtas (parliament) to legislate for the termination of pregnancies.
In the United States, abortion is a divisive issue in politics and culture wars, though a majority of Americans support access to abortion. Abortion laws vary widely from state to state.
Abortion in Canada is legal throughout pregnancy and is publicly funded as a medical procedure under the combined effects of the federal Canada Health Act and provincial health-care systems. However, access to services and resources varies by region. While some restrictions exist, Canada is one of the few nations with no criminal restrictions on abortion. Abortion is subject to provincial healthcare regulatory rules and guidelines for physicians. No provinces offer abortion on request at 24 weeks and beyond, although there are exceptions for certain medical complications.
Abortion laws vary widely among countries and territories, and have changed over time. Such laws range from abortion being freely available on request, to regulation or restrictions of various kinds, to outright prohibition in all circumstances. Many countries and territories that allow abortion have gestational limits for the procedure depending on the reason; with the majority being up to 12 weeks for abortion on request, up to 24 weeks for rape, incest, or socioeconomic reasons, and more for fetal impairment or risk to the woman's health or life. As of 2022, countries that legally allow abortion on request or for socioeconomic reasons comprise about 60% of the world's population. In 2024, France became the first country to explicitly protect abortion rights in its constitution.
Chile's abortion laws have undergone significant changes in recent years. Prior to 2017, Chile had one of the strictest abortion laws globally, prohibiting the practice altogether. However, since then, abortion has become legal in certain circumstances.
Abortion in Brazil is a crime, with penalties of one to three years of imprisonment for the recipient of the abortion, and one to four years of imprisonment for the doctor or any other person who performs the abortion on someone else. In three specific situations in Brazil, induced abortion is not punishable by law: in cases of risk to the pregnant person's life; when the pregnancy is the result of rape; and if the fetus is anencephalic. In these cases, the Brazilian government provides the abortion procedure free of charge through the Sistema Único de Saúde. This does not mean that the law regards abortion in these cases as a right, but only that women who receive abortions under these circumstances, and the doctors, will not be punished. The punishment for a woman who performs an abortion on herself or consents to an abortion performed by another outside these legal exceptions is one to three years of detention. The base penalty for a third party that performs an illegal abortion with the consent of the patient, ranges from one to four years of detention, with the possibility of increase by a third if the woman comes to any physical harm, and can be doubled if she dies. Criminal penalties fixed at four years or less can be converted to non-incarceration punishments, such as community service and compulsory donation to charity.
Societal attitudes towards abortion have varied throughout different historical periods and cultures. One manner of assessing such attitudes in the modern era has been to conduct opinion polls to measure levels of public opinion on abortion.
Abortion is illegal in El Salvador. The law formerly permitted an abortion to be performed under some limited circumstances, but in 1998 all exceptions were removed when a new abortion law went into effect.
The timeline of women's legal rights (other than voting) represents formal changes and reforms regarding women's rights. The changes include actual law reforms, as well as other formal changes (e.g., reforms through new interpretations of laws by precedents). The right to vote is exempted from the timeline: for that right, see Timeline of women's suffrage. The timeline excludes ideological changes and events within feminism and antifeminism; for that, see Timeline of feminism.
This is a timeline of reproductive rights legislation, a chronological list of laws and legal decisions affecting human reproductive rights. Reproductive rights are a sub-set of human rights pertaining to issues of reproduction and reproductive health. These rights may include some or all of the following: the right to legal or safe abortion, the right to birth control, the right to access quality reproductive healthcare, and the right to education and access in order to make reproductive choices free from coercion, discrimination, and violence. Reproductive rights may also include the right to receive education about contraception and sexually transmitted infections, and freedom from coerced sterilization, abortion, and contraception, and protection from practices such as female genital mutilation (FGM).
Abortion in Poland is illegal except in cases where the pregnancy is a result of a criminal act or when the woman's life or health is in danger. The last change in the Act on Pregnancy Planning of the Republic of Poland took place on 27 January 2021, when publication of the judgment of the Polish Constitutional Tribunal in the Dziennik Ustaw RP took place.
Abortion in Ecuador is illegal except when performed in the case of a threat to the life or health of a pregnant woman or when the pregnancy is the result of rape, including but not only a sexual crime against a mentally disabled woman where her legal representative has consented to the abortion. In 2021, the Constitutional Court of Ecuador ruled for the decriminalization of abortion in all cases of rape.
Abortion in Colombia is freely available on request up to the 24th week of pregnancy, due to a ruling by the Constitutional Court on February 21, 2022. Later in pregnancy, it is only allowed in cases of risk of death to the pregnant woman, fetal malformation, or rape, according to a Constitutional Court ruling in 2006.
The legality of abortion in the United States and the various restrictions imposed on the procedure vary significantly, depending on the laws of each state or other jurisdiction, although there is no uniform federal law. Some states prohibit abortion at all stages of pregnancy, with few exceptions; others permit it up to a certain point in a woman's pregnancy, while some allow abortion throughout a woman's pregnancy. In states where abortion is legal, several classes of restrictions on the procedure may exist, such as parental consent or notification laws, requirements that patients be shown an ultrasound before obtaining an abortion, mandatory waiting periods, and counseling requirements.
The Dominican Republic is one of 24 countries in the world and one of six in Latin America that has a complete ban on abortion. This complete ban includes situations in which a pregnant person’s life is at risk.
Abortion in Zimbabwe is available under limited circumstances. Zimbabwe's current abortion law, the Termination of Pregnancy Act, was enacted by Rhodesia's white minority government in 1977. The law permits abortion if the pregnancy endangers the life of the woman or threatens to permanently impair her physical health, if the child may be born with serious physical or mental defects, or if the fetus was conceived as a result of rape or incest. Nevertheless, an estimated 70,000+ illegal abortions are performed in Zimbabwe each year.
Abortion in Costa Rica is severely restricted by criminal law. Currently, abortions are allowed in Costa Rica only in order to preserve the life or physical health of the woman. Abortions are illegal in almost all cases, including when the pregnancy is a result of rape or incest and when the foetus suffers from medical problems or birth defects. Both social and economic factors have led to this legal status. It remains unclear whether abortions are legal to preserve the mental health of the woman, though the 2013 United Nations abortion report says Costa Rica does allow abortions concerning the mental health of a woman.
Abortion-rights movements are movements that advocate for legal access to induced abortion services, including elective abortion. They seek to represent and support women who wish to terminate their pregnancy without fear of legal or social backlash. These movements are in direct opposition to anti-abortion movements.
Abortion in Texas is illegal in most cases. There are nominally exceptions to save the mother's life, or prevent "substantial impairment of major bodily function", but the law on abortion in Texas is written in such an ambiguous way that life-threatening or harmful pregnancies do not explicitly constitute an exception.
Abortion in South Korea was decriminalized, effective 1 January 2021, by a 2019 order of the Constitutional Court of Korea. It is currently legal throughout pregnancy, as no new law has been enacted. Thus there are no gestational limits or other restrictions.
