therapeutic abortion

A Catholic bishop in Brazil says the mother and doctors of a nine-year-old girl, pregnant as a result of incest and who had an abortion, should be excommunicated.

After more than a hundred years of legally allowing women access to a therapeutic abortion, in October 2006 the Nicaraguan National Assembly banned this procedure in all circumstances. Now women's health groups are working to mitigate the damage.

Last Thursday, the Nicaraguan National Assembly voted 66-3 to recriminalize therapeutic abortion during an overhaul of the Nicaraguan penal code, again choosing unvarnished political opportunism over accepted medical consensus and concern for women's health.