Update:Abortion Denied By Laws? El Salvador Court Denies Ill Woman's Abortion That Would Save Her Life

In El Salvador it is illegal to have an abortion no matter the reason. Doctors and patients who are known to have had or performed abortions are put in jail.

22-year-old Beatriz is dying of lupus and is 23-weeks pregnant. Doctors say terminating the pregnancy will increase the chances of saving her life. The fetus, doctors say will not survive after birth and is putting the mother in great risk.

The 22-year-old mother of 1 will only be identified as Beatriz. Thinkprogress.org says that lupus is a disease in which the body's immune system destroys its own healthy tissue. Beatriz's pregnancy aggravated her condition and placed her life in danger.

Doctors told Beatriz bringing the pregnancy to full term would not be a good option for either the fetus or herself. The fetus once born would not survive long due to the fact that it is missing a large part of its brain and skull.

Beatriz has been fighting to have an abortion since she got the news she would not survive a full term pregnancy. Because an abortion is illegal in El Salvador Beatriz had to take her case to the Supreme Court and petition the government to allow the procedure that will save her life.

The case would not have had to go all the way to the top of the government if El Salvador's attorney general used his ability to shield Beatriz and her doctors from prosecution and allow the abortion. The attorney general was asked but refused, thinkprogress.org reports.

El Salvador has such harsh abortion laws due to the fact that the country is mostly Catholic. The Catholic Church has a known moral objection to abortion because they believe that life begins and the moment of conception. Therefore in the eyes of the Catholic Church abortion is murder.

Beatriz recorded a video which has been posted to YouTube asking the President of El Salvador to save her life.

"I ask President Mauricio Funes to help me so that the court rules [authorizing the doctors to] end my pregnancy," Beatriz says in her video plea. "I feel bad because of everything that is happening, because they don't want to do it. Even knowing that the child is not going to survive once it's born."

"I think it would be best for them to go ahead, to save my life," Beatriz said in her video.

CNN reports that Beatriz is not the first Latin American woman whose life was put in danger by a government refusing to allow doctors to preform lifesaving abortions.

In 2012 a woman from the Dominican Republic diagnosed with leukemia was denied chemotherapy because she was pregnant. Eventually the woman was allowed to start her treatments but she and her fetus both died.

Latin America is not the only place in the world where abortion is illegal even in the case of life threatening illness. An Irish woman died last October when she was denied an abortion despite the fact the fetus was dying. Savita Halappanavar died of blood poisoning resulting from slowly miscarrying the fetus.

"It doesn't make sense to continue with my pregnancy if the baby won't survive," Beatriz said in her video. "I hope the court accepts."

"I want to live. I ask them from the bottom of my heart to do it."

Beatriz explains in her video that the doctors treating her want to do the abortion in order to save her life. They are simply afraid of going to prison and won't take the chance without the government's permission.

Beatriz's ends the video saying,

"I ask that they're not imprisoned for what they're going to do for me."

Policymic.com says the court is expected to make a decision in Beatriz's case in the next 14-days.