Mexico’s Supreme Court decriminalized abortion across the conservative Latin American country on Wednesday, moving in the opposite direction of the United States, where constitutionally mandated abortion rights were repealed last year.
On social media, the court stated that the legal system that penalizes abortion in the Federal Penal Code is unconstitutional because it violates the human rights of women and people with the capacity to gestate.
It follows a similar Supreme Court verdict two years ago that declared abortion to be legal, thus legalizing it throughout Mexico.
That declaration came as a result of a constitutional challenge to the penal code of the northern state of Coahuila, allowing women across the country to access the treatment without fear of prosecution.
The Information Group on Reproductive Choice (GIRE), which advocates for abortion rights, applauded the latest move towards legalizing abortion on a national scale.
“Federal health institutions across the country will be required to provide abortion services to women and people with the ability to gestate who request it”, the group announced on social media.
Mexico’s policies are diametrically opposed to those in the United States, where a Supreme Court decision in June 2022 repealed the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade decision protecting the right to abortion nationwide.
As a result of the circumstances, some women in the United States have sought abortion assistance from campaigners in Mexico across the border.
Abortion had previously been decriminalized in a dozen of Mexico’s 32 states, beginning with Mexico City in 2007.
“However, in addition to a shortage of facilities to carry out the surgery, many women don’t know that they have this right because local governments have not carried out publicity campaigns about it”, women’s rights campaigner Sara Lovera said.
“That is why today’s Supreme Court decision is significant”, Lovera told media.
Women’s rights concerns have caused some conflicts in Catholic-majority Mexico, where both sides of the abortion debate often stage street protests.
The Church has traditionally opposed abortion reforms.
There have also been reports of health personnel reporting women for having illegal abortions, which resulted in their incarceration.
Elective abortion is allowed in Argentina, Colombia, Cuba, and Uruguay, while Argentine presidential candidate Javier Milei wants to outlaw it.
It is legal in several countries under particular conditions, such as rape or health problems, although it is illegal in El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Haiti, and the Dominican Republic.
