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Mothers’ Day: the right to care is necessary to ensure free and desired motherhood

by | May 8, 2024 | Abortion, myths and stigma, Human rights, Sexual and Reproductive Rights, Teenagers

– Motherhood, nurturing and care, historically, have been attributed to women and feminized identities, who have been assigned family welfare and domestic work without economic remuneration.
– In the region, only 14 countries guarantee the minimum number of weeks of paid maternity leave established by the International Labor Organization (ILO).
– The longest paternity leaves are barely 20 days (in Mexico) and in some cases do not exceed two days (in Argentina). Mothers assume the burden of care for almost the entire postpartum period. This inequality can have serious consequences for their development and well-being.

Almost half of pregnancies in the world are unwanted, according to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) report in 2022. For women, adolescents, girls and people with childbearing capacity, the reproductive decision that will henceforth define their lives, i.e., deciding whether or not to continue the pregnancy, is not an option that is left in their hands.

The ability to decide when, how, and whether or not to become a mother is fundamental for people to be able to follow their life plans free of stereotypes and gender roles. Therefore, it is essential to support their reproductive autonomy, the right of each person to choose, so that motherhood is a decision and not a sentence of death, poverty or loss of health, as happens in many cases.

The UNFPA report notes that:

– More than 60% of unintended pregnancies end in abortion.
– Approximately 45% of all abortions performed worldwide are unsafe.
– Unsafe abortions are the cause of 13% of maternal deaths.

Motherhood and care work
Socially, motherhood has been associated with life-sustaining work, without remuneration or recognition. Gender inequality in these jobs determines access to health services and the formal labor market.
Worldwide, women spend 3.2 times more time than men on caregiving tasks, but in Latin America the gap is even wider: women spend almost 20% of their day on unpaid and unrecognized care work, while men spend just over 7%. This inequality is reflected in greater barriers for women to access the formal labor market and widens the wage gap and informal employment rates.
In Mexico, for example, according to the Mexican Institute for Competitiveness (IMCO), 25 million women depend on a family member to access public health services; in the case of men, this figure is reduced to half. Why is this situation? Public health is related to labor formality.

They are the ones who prioritize employment in flexible jobs in order to be able to continue with their other caregiving tasks. IMCO points out that the most prevalent employment benefits among women caregivers are those that allow them to:

– 73% were absent to carry out some formality.
– 67% absent to care for someone else.
– 40% to bring their sons, daughters and children to the workplace.
Inequality in care represents an obstacle for women and people with the capacity to bear children to develop professionally. Therefore, the decision to continue, or not, a pregnancy is linked to reproductive autonomy.

Care and reproductive autonomy
In March of this year, Ipas LAC, in collaboration with the Center for Reproductive Rights and more than 10 civil society organizations, petitioned the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR) to recognize the right to care as a right that guarantees that all people can make decisions for themselves, that is, that they can decide about their own bodies, their lives and their health, without pressure, discrimination or violence.

Likewise, the link between this right and reproductive autonomy should be recognized:

By exercising the right to care for someone else in order to guarantee that this decision is made under conditions of freedom, equality of time, money and services (for example, to have access to a day care center).
2. By exercising the right to be cared for, cared for or cared for.
In the latter case, forced maternity (due to the criminalization of abortion) directly affects infants and adolescents, who are in need of care. And, on the other hand, non-compliance with this right in pregnant girls and adolescents affects their access to education and paid and formal work, in addition to implying risks to their physical and mental health.

Among the petitions submitted to the Court were:

– Implement care policies from a rights-based, intersectional and intercultural perspective, including paid parental and family leave, quality early childhood care infrastructure and services, and income transfers for care purposes.
– Legalize abortion and other reproductive health services, so that people choose to care freely and be cared for when it comes to pregnancies in girls and adolescents.
Remove barriers to access to legal abortion and ensure the practice in confidentiality, without prerequisites, such as consent or approval of third parties.
– To offer quality, intersectional, intercultural, physically accessible, affordable and culturally acceptable services so that rural, rural, indigenous and racialized women and girls can make informed and free decisions regarding abortion and reproductive health practices.
– Approve mifepristone and misoprostol for obstetric and gynecological use to facilitate self-managed abortion, and develop information guides on safe abortion practices, in clear language and adapted to indigenous peoples’ languages, in order to guarantee the right to self-care.
To learn more about the application before the Court, please refer to:
The infographics are also available for download:

Sources:

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Contact us to arrange an interview with our spokespersons:

Irene Vázquez Gudiño
Media Liaison Coordinator
+52 55 3428 0544
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