Society of gynecologists in Peru to demand legalization of abortion in cases of rape

Lima, Peru, Jan 18, 2005 / 22:00 pm

The Peruvian medical journal “Gestión Diaria” is reporting that a group of doctors lead by the president of the Peruvian Society of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Valentin Jaimes, is demanding abortion be legal in cases of rape.

Currently the Society, representatives of the Ministry of Health, the Ministry for Women and different international groups that work in the area of so-called “sexual and reproductive rights” are drafting a Guide or Protocol for legal abortion, including abortion in cases of rape.

“We are asking that the Guide include (pregnancies due to rape) as one of the reasons for the legal termination of a pregnancy, and these reasons will have to be approved by the Medical College and the Health Minister, and after by Congress,” said Jaimes.

According to Jaimes, abortions for pregnancies resulting from rape are justified because “the pregnancy is a constant reminder of the rape for the woman.  Moreover, nobody wants to have an unwanted child who is the fruit of violence.”

Although Jaimes acknowledged he did not have any figures on how many pregnancies result from rape, he insisted that “the unwanted child is a problem throughout the world and one-fourth of all children that are born are unwanted.  In our country during the last decade more than one million of these children have been born.”

For Jaimes, “to be an unwanted child leads the mother to see the child as a problem in her life, to not give the child the necessary affection and circumstances are created in which the child may not emotional develop properly.”  This would be enough to justify abortion, he argued.