Abortion and women's roles in society: opinions from Tlaxcala, Mexico.

OBJECTIVE We aim to assess the opinions of Mexicans in the state of Tlaxcala on abortion and other topics concerning women's reproductive health and status in society. MATERIAL AND METHODS We summarize opinions on abortion and women's roles in society and perform logit regressions to assess characteristics correlated with support for abortion rights. RESULTS A majority of respondents were against a woman's right to abortion when asked generally, but when asked about specific circumstances, a majority supported the right to abortion in five of the nine hypothetical circumstances proposed. In multivariate analysis, age, education, religion, religious service attendance, and views regarding women's roles in society had significant effects on support for the right to abortion. CONCLUSIONS Our results demonstrate that residents of Tlaxcala view abortion as a personal decision and support a woman's right to abortion in more circumstances than currently allowed under state law.