El Salvador's strict ban on abortions has caused the questionable denial of an abortion to a woman who was near death; and was nearly denied to another woman who was to give birth to a stillborn. That woman was later allowed to terminate, but only performed using a C-section, which is an extremely painful and dangerous procedure when it isn't done under the right conditions. But now, El Salvador is now jailing women for having miscarriages, women who've lost children not of their own volition.

Women who suffer miscarriages in El Salvador tend to stay away from public hospitals because if they were to seek medical assistance in the public sector, they know that they'd be accused of murder.

On October 30, 2012, 19-year-old Glenda Xiomara Cruz suffered heavy bleeding and abdominal pain. She went to a hospital in Puerto El Triunfo, and doctors told her that she had suffered a miscarriage. Cruz wasn't aware that she was pregnant, as her cycle had continued, and a pregnancy test that she'd taken a few months earlier had negative results. Four days later, Cruz was arrested and charged with the aggravated murder of a 38-to-42 week fetus.

Cruz was too weak to attend the court hearing, and had to endure two emergency operations and three weeks in the hospital before she was moved to a women's prison. And, last month, she was sentenced to 10 years in jail.

Dennis Munoz Estanley is Cruz's defense attorney, as well as the attorney to 29 other women who are being convicted for abortion. And, of those women, only one actually attained an abortion, the other 28 reportedly suffered miscarriages. He claimed that these women were targeted to prove that the government is hard on women who seek terminations.

Slate indicated that this type of situation could easily arise in the United States if abortions were to become illegal. "All you need is a conservative doctor plus a miscarrying patient who triggers that doctor's bigotries-likely, the same poor, unmarried, or poorly educated women that are enduring this treatment in El Salvador," Amanda Marcotte of Slate indicated.