Bulls rack up high score
in unique Tico event


The score so far at the Fiestas de San José is bulls 15, Ticos 0.

That is the number of persons who have been taken to metro hospitals after challenging a fighting bull in the ring at the carnival, which started Christmas Day.

One participant got a 360-degree ride on the horn of a bull and ended up in the hospital with a punctured lung and three broken ribs.

The Cruz Roja reported that 137 persons had been treated at first aid centers at the carnival. Most are battered bull fighters or toreros improvisados.

This year carnival officials required those participating in the popular bull fights to take out individual insurance policies. The Cruz Roja figures reflect only the first three days of the carnival. The agency has 55 persons working at the bull ring, and the facility was constructed with its own clinic.

It is no coincidence that Hospital Calderón Guardia is reporting that its blood bank is short 0-positive donors. This is where most of the injured bullfighters go.

The bull fights are broadcast by Channel 6 each evening, and the bull ring is open to the public from 3 p.m. to 9 p.m. each day of the carnival.

There is some traditional bull riding at the carnival, but the most anticipated event is when 100 to 200 young men and some women get into the ring to badger a fighting bull. Sometimes the bull manages to catch a tormentor.


Restricting abortions creates
environment of hypocrisy

Dear A.M. Costa Rica:

Your staff misrepresents the legal status of abortion in Costa Rica (“Physician arrested,” Dec. 28).  Abortion is not “against the law” in this country but is legally permitted to save a woman’s life or to preserve her physical health.

Unfortunately, restrictive interpretations of the law mean that almost no terminations are performed (or, at least, are reported to be performed) in the hospitals or health clinics of the Caja Costarricense.  Thus, women who need to terminate a pregnancy even for health reasons must find and pay a private provider for an “illegal” procedure.   This creates an environment of hypocrisy, a lucrative source of income for providers, unequal access to safe services among low-income women and lack of medical supervision.

As is the case in other countries, restrictive laws do not reduce the number of abortions performed. They only drive them underground.  A 2008 study by the Costa Rican Demographic Association estimates that 27,000 induced abortions are performed here every year — about the same rate (per woman) as in the United States, where abortion is legal on request.  Most are performed by medical personnel, frequently with the use of the drug Misoprostol, which induces bleeding, and are thus relatively safe.  Nevertheless, about 8,000 women are treated every year by the Caja Costarricense for avoidable abortion complications

A 2009 report by the Guttmacher Institute estimates that one-quarter of all pregnancies worldwide are terminated each year by induced abortion.  Unsafe abortion accounts for one-sixth of all pregnancy-related deaths to women globally.  If health systems were to ensure safe and affordable abortion services to all who need them, women would not have to resort to unsafe procedures, and medical professionals would not risk criminal action for assisting a woman in her request to terminate a pregnancy, as is the case in your story.