All Argentine news channels broadcast live and outside the Senate, thousands of supporters of legal abortion had gathered to follow the vote.

"This is one of the most historic days in the country's history," said a young woman with the characteristic green snuff handkerchief tied around her neck.

After a year dominated by the corona pandemic - where Argentina, despite one of the world's longest quarantines, has suffered from widespread contagion and high death rates - 2020 will now also be remembered as the year when the Argentine women's dream came true.

One hundred year old law is replaced

When all the senators who were insecure in the end finally declared that they would vote for the bill, it became clear that Argentina is taking the historic step of legalizing abortion.

During the last dramatic days of 2020, a hundred-year-old law from 1921 is now being replaced, which only gave Argentine women the opportunity to have an abortion if they were raped or if their lives were in danger.



In Argentina, up to half a million illegal abortions are performed each year and 38,000 women have to be hospitalized due to complications.

The new bill provides the opportunity to freely decide on abortion until the fourteenth week of pregnancy.

Two years ago, a similar bill fell in the Senate by a narrow margin.

But the current left-wing nationalist government, which was elected just over a year ago, had promised in the election campaign to push through legal abortion and the political pressure is seen as one of the decisive reasons why it was a yes this time.

The women's movement has succeeded

The decision to legalize abortion is a great success for the Argentine women's movement, which has been pushing the issue for many years.

They have made the green color a symbol of legal abortion and everywhere on the streets of Buenos Aires, schoolgirls, working women and older ladies have shown their support by wearing green sweaters, shawls and bracelets.

And the campaigns and symbols of the Argentine women's movement have aroused enthusiasm and horror throughout Latin America.

The Argentine women's movement has been very successful in reformulating the abortion issue


from 'for or against abortion' to 'safe legal abortions or dangerous illegal abortions'.

In this way, they have succeeded in shifting the focus of the abortion issue from morality to health care.

When the senators who were hesitant before the vote last night were to explain their decisions to vote yes to legal abortion, it became clear that this particular strategy had been successful.

"I have not changed my personal view of abortion.

But I approach the issue in a different way.

This is not about feminism or religion.

The underground abortions kill and are a dark chapter in the history of this country ", so a conservative female senator justified her yes vote.

Gets great importance

So far, only the two smaller countries, Cuba and Uruguay, have had legal abortions in the region.

The fact that the giant Argentina is now joining the club will be of great importance in Latin America, which has some of the world's strictest abortion laws.

Argentina is a country with great regional influence - not least media and cultural - and this victory for the Argentine women's movement will bring ripples on the water from Chile to Mexico.

Can we then expect a green wave sweeping across Latin America?

There is much to suggest that.

But it will take time.

Political systems are tough and each country obviously has its specific power relations.

Conservative groups based in the Catholic Church and the fast-growing free churches will do everything in their power to slow down development.

But it is probably still only a matter of time before more countries follow in Argentina's footsteps.

In Latin America, rapid changes in traditional norms are taking place and the issue of abortion has become a clear symbol of that process.