A 14-year-old rape victim has died during childbirth in Paraguay, where abortion is forbidden unless giving birth threatens the life of the mother.
Her baby is stable but relying on a breathing machine, the medical team told the Guardian. The girl, who has not been named, had been hospitalized for 20 days because of pregnancy complications when she went into labor.
A 37-year-old man who raped and impregnated the girl was arrested on Thursday, according to Ricardo González Borgne, the head of the the National Secretariat for Children and Adolescents (SNNA).
Doctors attempted to deliver the baby vaginally until the young mother had a respiratory complication. They were attempting an emergency caesarean section when the girl suffered an embolism, three cardiac arrests and then died.
“It was very sudden. They attempted advanced resuscitation in intensive care, but we could not save her. Her body was not ready for a pregnancy,” Hernán Martínez, the director of the National Hospital of Itauguá, told local media.
The episode echoes an incident in 2015 when Paraguayan authorities prevented a 10-year-old from having an abortion after she was raped by her stepfather.
In that case, the girl – who was given the pseudonym Mainumby to protect her identity – survived childbirth but has not yet received the housing that the government promised to give her, according to Amnesty International.
Mainumby’s case put renewed focus on Paraguay’s strict abortion laws – and the prevalence of sexual abuse there. According to figures from the health ministry, 889 girls between the ages of 10 and 14 gave birth in 2015.
Rosalía Vega, director of the Paraguayan section of Amnesty International, said: “We are a country that does not have a sex education based on science. The authorities take advantage of the Catholic majority in the country to promote laws based on religious convictions, not scientific.”
- This article was amended on 26 March 2018 to remove an image of a Red Cross facility which had no connection to this case.