Abortion Laws and Women's Health

Damian Clarke and Hanna Mühlrad ()

No 11890, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: We examine the impact of progressive and regressive abortion legislation on women's health and survival in Mexico. Following a 2007 reform in the Federal District of Mexico which decriminalised and subsidised early-term elective abortion, multiple other Mexican states increased sanctions on illegal abortion. We observe that the original progressive policy resulted in a sharp decline in maternal morbidity, particularly maternal morbidity due to haemorrhage early in pregnancy. We observe small or null impacts on women's health from increasing sanctions on illegal abortion. We find some evidence to suggest that these impacts were also observed when considering maternal mortality, though effects are less precisely estimated.

Keywords: maternal morbidity; maternal mortality; political economy; legislative reform; abortion (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: H75 I18 J13 K38 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 77 pages
Date: 2018-10
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-hea
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

Published - published in: Journal of Health Economics, 2021, 76 (C), 102413

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Journal Article: Abortion laws and women’s health (2021)
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