「经济学人」Not the end of it

They are more readily available than in the past but no less controversial

Mexico has long been a popular destination for Americans seeking nose jobs or dental work. But since 2022, when the United States' Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade, thereby removing the constitutional right to abortion, American women have started heading south to terminate unwanted pregnancies. That they can do so is testament to a recent expansion of the right to an abortion in Mexico, a trend that is mirrored across Latin America.

The number of Latinas who are able to obtain an abortion legally has grown dramatically in recent years. In December 2020 Argentina, the region's fourth-most populous country, made abortion legal. In 2023, after several Mexican states had removed their prohibitions, the country's Supreme Court ordered the rest to follow suit. (Mexico City, the trailblazer, has allowed abortion since 2007.) In 2022 Colombia's constitutional court made abortion legal up to the 24th week of pregnancy, just as it is in Britain.

But the trend is not universal. Latin America still has notably strict rules. The Centre for Reproductive Rights, an NGO in New York, notes that two of the four countries in the world that have rolled back abortion rights recently are in Latin America: Nicaragua and El Salvador (Poland and the United States are the other two). Both of those Central American countries impose harsh penalties on women who get abortions and the doctors who assist them.

In Brazil, the right-wing opposition is proposing a law that would equate abortion—which is already allowed only with very heavy restrictions—to murder. Argentine women could see their newfound freedoms removed too. Their firebrand president, Javier Milei, has said that he would hold a referendum on the right to abortion.

Where abortion is allowed, it is often permitted only in extremely limited circumstances. Some countries restrict it to the first trimester, or to those pregnancies which are the result of rape. Nor does mere legality necessarily mean abortion is available in practice. For example, many Mexican states have yet to reform their state constitutions or to ensure that services are available.

Criminalising abortion makes no sense: it still happens, but in more dangerous conditions. What's more, legalising abortion doesn't necessarily increase its use. As access to abortion in Latin America has expanded over the past 30 years, the share of women who get an abortion in a given year has declined from 35 per 1,000 to 32, according to estimates by the Guttmacher Institute, a research outfit in New York. (Central America is an exception; there it has risen despite harsh prohibitions.) One reason is that Latin America has done well at reducing unplanned pregnancies. They fell by 27% over the same period. Better reproductive services are a win-win proposition.

This article appeared in the The Americas section of the print edition under the headline “Not the end of it”(Oct 10th 2024)

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