Teodora del Carmen Vásquez has finally been released from prison after serving ten years of her 30-year prison sentence and losing an appeal of her case only last December. She was incarcerated under an aggravated homicide charge for delivering a stillborn baby, as a result of El Salvador’s harsh abortion laws. These laws criminalize abortion in any and all cases, including rape, incest, fetus abnormalities, and significant risk to the mother’s life.

El Salvador’s Supreme Court ruled that there was insufficient scientific evidence confirming that Vásquez had strangled her baby after its birth – something her prosecutors have maintained since she was convicted in 2007. The Supreme Court stated that Vásquez should be released for “powerful reasons of justice” and “equity.” However, the Supreme Court merely reduced her sentence, but did not overturn her conviction, so she is still considered guilty under El Salvador’s justice system. According to Amnesty International, her lawyers will ask for redress and compensation for the time she spent in prison, and will also attempt to clear her name.

Almost 11 years ago, police found Vásquez unconscious in a pool of her own blood, after she had fainted and collapsed at a school. Although she had called for an ambulance, help never arrived. Within three months, Vásquez was arrested and convicted of killing her child, although she, her lawyers, and human rights groups maintain she gave birth to a stillborn baby. In December of 2017, her appeal was denied by the same court that tried her originally, despite the fact that the autopsy for her case had since been discredited by forensic experts as “inadequate” and “inconclusive.”

Currently, El Salvador is one of only five countries in the world that strictly enforces a total ban on abortion. Although a bill has been introduced into parliament that would allow abortion in certain cases, a change of this magnitude in a conservative, Catholic-influenced culture and government may be slow to come.

Vásquez has become known as a member of ‘Las 17,’ a group of 17 women who have been given sentences of 30 to 40 years under El Salvador’s strict abortion laws. Vasquez is the fourth member of ‘Las 17’ to be released from prison. According to The Guardian, she is the 16th woman to be released as a result of human rights appeals and campaigns organized by rights groups and lawyers.

Social justice groups in South America and across the world agree that El Salvador’s abortion laws are a human rights violation that deny women their right to health, life, dignity, and their own bodies. While Vásquez’s release, and the release of other women in similar positions, is a success for women’s reproductive rights in El Salvador, the very fact that such laws continue to exist keep vulnerable women in positions of increasing powerlessness. Further, a change in the law would be only the beginning. A lack of health and pregnancy information, societal misogyny, and the stigma against women who have abortions must also be addressed.

Regardless, small victories like these highlight the power that human rights campaigns can have. At the very least, Vásquez’s freedom can give hope to women in similar situations and encourage others to continue to fight for women’s reproductive rights in El Salvador and around the world.