By Lais Morais
SAO PAULO (Reuters) – When Rebeca Mendes became pregnant, she fought for the right to have an abortion in Brazil. The Supreme Court denied her request to allow it in 2017, so she flew to Colombia to terminate her pregnancy.
Now she is an activist for the right to have safe and legal abortions in a country where they are only allowed in the case of rape, fetal deformation or the mother’s life is in danger.
The prospects are not good. In Brazil’s Conservative-led Congress last week, a committee voted for a constitutional amendment to ban abortion altogether and make it illegal even in those three extreme cases.
In Sao Paulo, Brazil’s largest city, the mayor’s office ordered one of the country’s few hospitals that performed legal abortions in those exceptional cases – even on pregnancies of more than 22 weeks’ gestation – to stop.
This prompted a loud protest by women at a public hearing in the city council last week, demanding that the service continue at the Cachoeirinha Municipal Maternity Hospital.
Mendes lamented that Brazilian hospitals do not cooperate with women seeking legal abortions, but instead even tell the police, disclosing their medical records.
“These women are being investigated, so the situation is much worse than we thought,” she told Reuters at the hearing.
“Medical records that are being violated and women are being reported to the police for having a legal abortion.”
Mendes complained that Sao Paulo’s abortion services are not doing their job and neglecting women in need of legal abortions.
“We get daily reports of girls and women who go to seek legal abortions here in the city and they hear nonsense from the hospital staff that appear to act like the police,” she said.
Mendes recalled how easy it was to get an abortion in Bogota, Colombia, and how supportive the hospital staff was.
“I remember talking to the doctor who explained my options and type of treatment. And then it happened and it happened very quickly,” she said.
“He looked at me and said, ‘It’s over.’ And then I cried and cried and cried. But it was a cry of relief, you know? It’s finally over, I got what I wanted.”
In Brazil, Mendes said she would have had to resort to clandestine clinics that perform abortions that are sometimes botched, resulting in the woman’s death.
Driven by her experience, Mendes started a nongovernmental organization called Project Vivas to help women who seek safe abortions in Brazil or abroad. Her organization has assisted 407 girls and women, according to its website.
(Reporting by Lais Morais; Writing by Anthony Boadle; Editing by Richard Chang)
Comments