Abortion in Brazil

Abortion In Brazil

Abortion can only be legally performed in Brazil if the pregnancy puts the life of the woman in danger or if the pregnancy is the result of a rape. The punishment for a woman which performs an abortion on herself or consents to an abortion performed by another outside these legal exceptions is based in one to three years of detention. The base penalty for a third part that performs an illegal abortion in a woman, with her consentment, varies from one to four years of detention, with the possibility of elevation by one third if the woman gets any physical harm, and can be doubled if she dies. Criminal penalties fixed in four years or less can be converted to non-incarceration punishments, such as community service and compulsory donation to charity.

Brazil is a signatory of the American Human Rights Convention. The Convention grants the right to life to human embryos, "in general, from the moment of conception", and has a legal status on a par with the Constitution in Brazilian Law. The Civil Code of Brazil also safeguards the rights of the unborn. In a 2008 case, however, the Supreme Federal Court ruled, by a 6-5 vote, that the right to life applies only to intrauterine embryos, and that frozen embryos not eligible to a uterus transfer do not hold fundamental rights and may be manipulated for research purposes. On 2012, the Supreme Court also authorized the practice of abortion on fetuses with anencephaly.