An abortion campaigner has died after a legal medical abortion in Argentina, after the country legalised abortion on demand on 30 December 2020.

Twenty-three year old Maria de Valle Gonzalez Lopez died earlier this month on 11 April, four days after being legally prescribed abortion pills in the Arturo Illia hospital in La Paz, Argentina.

Clarín newspaper reports that on 7 April “she was prescribed a medication – presumably misoprostol – and on Friday she began to feel ill. She was referred to the main healthcare facility in the eastern area of Mendoza, Perrupato Hospital, where they diagnosed a general infection that may have caused her death”.

Ms. del Valle Gonzalez Lopez was studying social work at the National University of Cuyo.

A pro-life campaigner in Argentina, Guadalupe Batallán, said that “María del Valle was 23 years old and had her whole life in front of her. She was a student and had become president of Radical Youth in Mendoza. She had a legal abortion on Wednesday and by the weekend she was already dead”.

Abortion on demand was legalised in Argentina late last year

Since abortion on demand was introduced into Argentina late last year, it has been subject to a provincial legal challenge. In March, a judge in the Province of San Luis found that the abortion law was in conflict with the provincial law, which grants strong protections to unborn children. The judgement was issued by Judge María Eugenia Bona in response to a suit filed by former senator Liliana Negre.

The abortion bill itself was fast-tracked by President Alberto Fernández who introduced it as part of his campaign promise. This was the ninth time that a bill to legalise abortion had been introduced and has consistently faced strong public opposition.

Last year thousands joined in pro-life demonstrations which, according to organisers, took place in across more than 500 cities in Argentina in opposition to the abortion bill.

Argentines demonstrated for the protection of the unborn and support for mothers with unplanned pregnancies. Pro-lifers adopted the blue neckerchief as a symbol of the cause.

Lawmaker and participant of the Buenos Aires march, Victoria Morales Gorleri said: “We have to solve the problem by fighting poverty and creating jobs. There are other ways to go about this, not the elimination of a life … It’s a failure for a nation to legalize the death of a human being”.

Right To Life UK spokesperson, Catherine Robinson, said: “This is a tragic case of what appears to be a completely avoidable death. Unborn babies lose their lives every time an abortion is successfully performed and sadly sometimes their mothers do too”.