Across the world, incarcerated pregnant women are often held in deplorable conditions, leading some to miscarry or give birth alone inside a cell, say campaigners

Dina Hernández was 35 weeks pregnant when she was arrested near her home in San Salvador in March 2024. The 28-year-old human rights activist, who was with her five-year-old son, was accused of “illicit association” with gang members and jailed without evidence.

Three weeks later, her family received a call from the prison authorities to collect the body of her newborn baby. The cause of death has not been investigated and the family has no idea what happened, or whether Hernández – who is believed to remain in prison – received any postnatal care.

Cases such as Hernández’s are far from uncommon in El Salvador’s prisons, and throughout the world. Pregnant women are often kept in deplorable conditions and denied medical attention; some miscarry, others go into labour and give birth alone in a cell. Some babies die behind bars.

“Prison is not a good environment for women, let alone someone who is pregnant,” says Sabrina Mahtani, a British-Zambian lawyer and member of Women Beyond Walls, a global collaboration dedicated to combating the over-incarceration of women and girls. “There’s so much research that shows how harmful it is.

“Many prisons were built with men in mind, so women were an afterthought. There are lots of issues around violence, a lack of resources, a lack of sanitation, overcrowding, but also a real lack of gender-responsive care.”

It is 15 years since the UN general assembly adopted the Bangkok Rules for the treatment of female prisoners and non-custodial measures for female offenders. The first set of international guidelines to address the situation of incarcerated women, they were formulated in response to the growing female prison population worldwide. Since 2000, the number of women and girls in prison has risen by 57%, compared with a 22% increase in the male prison population over the same period.

The UN rules state that prison should be a last resort for pregnant women and that non-custodial sentences should always be considered first. They also say that “instruments of restraint shall never be used on women during labour, during birth and immediately after birth”.

Read full article: Shackled, alone and scared: the grim reality for women forced to give birth in prison