At first, Mila was denied an abortion at a hospital in the Peruvian Amazon. Now, and after international pressure, another hospital, in Lima, has allowed her to terminate the pregnancy.
It is one more case with impressive contours to shake Peru. A girl was raped and physically and psychologically abused by her stepfather since she was six years old. At eleven years old, she became pregnant and a Peruvian hospital denied her access to a therapeutic abortion. Now, the decision has been revoked and the minor, 17 weeks pregnant, will be able to terminate the pregnancy, advances El Mundo.
The National Maternal Perinatal Institute of Lima reported that a medical board decided to allow Mila, her fictitious name, to have an abortion, after the medical board of the hospital that treated her, in the Amazonian department of Loreto, denied her the abortion, arguing that the rape cases are not covered by the abortion protocol and that the health of the child is not at risk, the only requirement that can be invoked in Peru to terminate a pregnancy. In addition, the girl would have told the doctors that she wanted to continue with the pregnancy.
The decision of the Peruvian health authorities to prevent abortion changed after several international organizations drew attention to the case. The UN and the NGO Save the Children urged the Peruvian State to guarantee the girl’s right to abortion, warning that the decision goes against “the standards established by the Committee on the Rights of the Child” of the UN. CHS Alternativo (Peruvian association for the defense of human rights) warned that Mila did not have the opportunity to attend school, she does not know how to read or write.
Argentinian An institutionalized 12-year-old girl was raped, became pregnant with twins and was prevented from having an abortion
In July, the minor learned that she was 13 weeks pregnant. For this reason, the Loreto Special Protection Unit decided to send her, along with her three brothers, to a foster home, in order to protect her from the family, reports El País. Part of Mila’s stepfather, he was threatened and was unable to protect her. daughter, as she herself said after the case became public.
In the judicial sphere, and despite the attacks suffered by Mila and her family, the Peruvian justice released the attacker. This Friday, the Ministry of Women and Vulnerable Populations of Peru asked the Superior Court of Justice for the immediate arrest of the man.
Cases of child rape are common in Peru, a country that often denies girls the right to abortion. In June, the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child found that Peru had violated the rights to health and life of a 13-year-old indigenous girl named Camila, a rape victim, by failing to provide her with information or access to legal abortion and sure.
In 2020 alone, more than 4 cases of sexual violence against minors were registered. According to the newspaper El Comercio, every year 1,100 girls under the age of fifteen become mothers in Peru.
Source: Observadora
