Continued Practice of Abortion in El Salvador
Unsafe abortion is a serious public health problem and the second direct cause of maternal mortality in El Salvador. In 1994, the third-most-prevalent cause of mortality among adolescent girls was pregnancy and postpartum complications. Some of the girls arrested for trying to have abortions are as young as ten. It's a drain on resources in a country where health care expenditures in 1997 were $24 per person per year.
The criminalization of abortion has extremely serious consequences for women’s lives and health: abortions performed under dangerous conditions; high mortality and morbidity rates; and a lack of reliable studies that could help health services provide better care to their clients, including women who have had abortions in unsafe conditions. This situation is further exacerbated by the persecution of women by the Salvadoran justice and health systems.
Read more about this topic: Abortion In El Salvador
Famous quotes containing the words continued, practice and/or abortion:
“That, upon the whole, we may conclude that the Christian religion not only was at first attended with miracles, but even at this day cannot be believed by any reasonable person without one. Mere reason is insufficient to convince us of its veracity: And whoever is moved by Faith to assent to it, is conscious of a continued miracle in his own person, which subverts all the principles of his understanding, and gives him a determination to believe what is most contrary to custom and experience.”
—David Hume (1711–1776)
“To know how to be content, and to be so, protects one from disgrace; to know self-restraint and practice it protects one from shame.”
—Chinese proverb.
Lao-tzu.
“[The Republicans] offer ... a detailed agenda for national renewal.... [On] reducing illegitimacy ... the state will use ... funds for programs to reduce out-of-wedlock pregnancies, to promote adoption, to establish and operate children’s group homes, to establish and operate residential group homes for unwed mothers, or for any purpose the state deems appropriate. None of the taxpayer funds may be used for abortion services or abortion counseling.”
—Newt Gingrich (b. 1943)