The Supreme Court of Justice (SCJ) of Mexico on Wednesday repealed a federal law that penalized the abortionreaffirming a previous ruling that declared criminal sanctions for abortion unconstitutional and opening the door for the federal health system to provide services.
Mexico’s highest court declared criminal penalties for abortion unconstitutional in 2021, but the ruling applied only to the northern state of Coahuila, where the case originated.
Since then, the country’s 32 states and the federal government have been slow to change their penal codes accordingly.
On Wednesday, the SCJ sided with abortion rights groups in an appeal against the federal penal code and declared that the section of the national law that criminalized abortion could no longer be in force.
According to abortion rights advocates, the ruling would allow the federal health system to perform abortions, which could become increasingly important as Mexico looks to centralize health services.
The abortion rights legal advocacy group that brought the case welcomed the decision.
“With this resolution (…) any federal health institution must provide abortion services to all women and people with the capacity to gestate who request it,” said the Information Group on Chosen Reproduction (GIRE) in a statement.
A spokesman for the Ministry of Health, which oversees health services across the country, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The central state of Aguascalientes became the twelfth Mexican state to decriminalize abortion last month, when the SCJ sided with GIRE in a similar appeal against that state’s penal code.
Prepared with information from Reuters
Source: Gestion
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