Impact of ‘Maria da Penha Law' on Female Mortality due to Aggression in Brazil, 2001–11.

Objective: to evaluate the impact of the ‘Maria da Penha’ Law on the female mortality due to aggression in Brazil. Methods: a time series study with before-and-after design was conducted with data from the period 2001-2011. The number of deaths was corrected through proportional redistribution of the events of undetermined intent. Corrected mortality rates were calculated, and the Autoregressive Integrated Moving Average (ARIMA) process was used. Results: 54,107 deaths of women due to aggression were estimated in the study period. The corrected mortality rates were 5.28 and 5.22 per 100,000 women in the periods 2001-2006 and 2007-2011, respectively. Comparing the periods before and after the enactment of the law (2006), there was no reduction in annual female mortality rates due to aggression (p=0.846). Conclusion: the Law that created mechanisms to prevent domestic and family violence against women had no impact on the female mortality due to aggression.