PROJECT
Mexican National Opinion Survey on Reproductive Health and Social Issues

In June 2006 Council researchers completed a nationally representative face-to-face household survey of 3,513 urban and rural Mexicans aged 15–65 to understand their opinions on a range of reproductive health and social issues.

Sixty percent of participants had heard of emergency contraception (EC) (compared to 39 percent in the Council's previous survey in 2000), and 9 percent had ever used EC (question not asked in 2000). The majority of participants agreed “somewhat” or “very much” with abortion in cases of rape (68 percent), incest (53 percent), risk to the woman’s life (72 percent), or serious congenital malformations (59 percent). Support for abortion was low in cases of contraceptive failure (11 percent) or lack of economic resources (13 percent). In terms of specific health conditions, participants expressed greatest support for abortion in cases of HIV (64 percent), alcohol addiction (44 percent), and drug addiction (48 percent). Eight percent of men and women had ever heard of misoprostol, and 65 percent of these respondents knew that the medication can interrupt a pregnancy. (In Mexico, misoprostol is available in pharmacies, and women increasingly use it to induce an abortion.) Of the literate women who responded to sealed-envelope questions (n=1,518), 14 percent had experienced a pregnancy that they did not carry to term, and 4 percent had ever induced an abortion. One percent had ever used misoprostol to interrupt a pregnancy. Although the majority of women (57 percent) and men (62 percent) felt it was acceptable for couples to have premarital sex if they were in a loving relationship, only a minority of respondents agreed that casual premarital sex was acceptable (33 percent of women and 40 percent of men).

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Location

Mexico

Duration

June 2006

Population Council researchers

Claudia Diaz, Sandra Garcia, Eileen Yam

Non-Council collaborators

Católicas por el Derecho a Decidir—Mexico

Equidad de Género, Ciudadanía y Trabajo

Grupo de Información en Reproducción Elegida

Ipas Mexico

Ipsos-Bimsa

Donor

The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation

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See Also

• Mexico

• Reducing Unsafe Abortion

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