Free Essay

Abortion

In: Business and Management

Submitted By huayi
Words 2041
Pages 9
In Brief
Facts on Induced Abortion Worldwide
WORLDWIDE INCIDENCE AND TRENDS
• After declining substantially between 1995 and 2003, the worldwide abortion rate stalled between 2003 and 2008. • Between 1995 and 2003, the abortion rate (the number of abortions per 1,000 women of childbearing age—i.e., those aged 15–44) for the world overall dropped from 35 to 29. It remained virtually unchanged, at 28, in 2008. • Nearly half of all abortions worldwide are unsafe, and nearly all unsafe abortions (98%) occur in developing countries. In the developing world, 56% of all abortions are unsafe, compared with just 6% in the developed world. • The proportion of abortions worldwide that take place in the developing world increased between 1995 and 2008 from 78% to 86%, in part because the proportion of all women who live in the developing world increased during this period. • Since 2003, the number of abortions fell by 600,000 in the developed world but increased by 2.8 million in the developing world. In 2008, six million abortions were performed in developed countries and 38 million in developing countries, a disparity that largely reflects population distribution. • A woman’s likelihood of having an abortion is slightly elevated if she lives in a developing region. In 2008, there were 29 abortions per 1,000 women aged 15–44 years in developing countries, compared with 24 per 1,000 in the developed world.

REGIONAL INCIDENCE AND TRENDS
• The overall abortion rate in Africa, where the vast majority of abortions are illegal and unsafe, showed no decline between 2003 and 2008, holding at 29 abortions per 1,000 women of childbearing age. • The Southern Africa subregion, dominated by South Africa, where abortion was legalized in 1997, has the lowest abortion rate of all African subregions, at 15 per 1,000 women in 2008. East Africa has the highest rate, at 38, followed by Middle Africa at 36, West Africa at 28 and North Africa at 18. • Both the lowest and highest subregional abortion rates are in Europe, where abortion is generally legal under broad grounds. In Western Europe, the rate is 12 per 1,000 women, while in Eastern Europe it is 43. The discrepancy in rates between the two regions reflects relatively low contraceptive use in Eastern Europe, as well as a high degree of reliance on methods with relatively high user failure rates, such as the condom, withdrawal and the rhythm method. • In Europe, 30% of pregnancies end in abortion. A higher proportion of pregnancies end in abortion in Eastern Europe than in the rest of the region. • In Eastern Europe, the abortion rate held steady at 43 per 1,000 women between 2003 and 2008, after a period of steep decline between the mid-90s and the early 2000s.

NUMBERS AND RATES
Global and regional estimates of induced abortion, 1995, 2003 and 2008
Region No. of abortions (millions) 1995 World Developed countries Excluding Eastern Europe Developing countries Excluding China Africa Asia Europe Latin America Northern America Oceania 45.6 10.0 3.8 35.5 24.9 5.0 26.8 7.7 4.2 1.5 0.1 2003 41.6 6.6 3.5 35.0 26.4 5.6 25.9 4.3 4.1 1.5 0.1 2008 43.8 6.0 3.2 37.8 28.6 6.4 27.3 4.2 4.4 1.4 0.1 Abortion rate* 1995 35 39 20 34 33 33 33 48 37 22 21 2003 29 25 19 29 30 29 29 28 31 21 18 2008 28 24 17 29 29 29 28 27 32 19 17

*Abortions per 1,000 women aged 15–44. Source: Sedgh G et al., Induced abortion: incidence and trends worldwide from 1995 to 2008, Lancet, 2012, (forthcoming).

• Western Europe, Southern Africa and Northern Europe have the lowest abortion rates in the world, at 12, 15 and 17, respectively. • The abortion rate fell in Latin America from 37 to 31 abortions per 1,000 women between 1995 and 2003; it has held fairly steady since, reaching 32 in 2008. • In Latin America, subregional abortion rates range from 29 in Central America (the subregion that includes Mexico) to 32 in South America and 39 in the Caribbean. The Caribbean (the subregion that includes Cuba, where abortions are generally safe) has the lowest proportion of abortions in the region that are unsafe (46%), compared with nearly 100% in Central and South America. • In Asia, abortion rates across subregions held steady between 2003 and 2008, ranging from 26 per 1,000 in South Central Asia and Western Asia to 36 per 1,000 in Southeastern Asia. • Abortion incidence appears to have risen in China since 2003, after an extended period of decline. Evidence shows that this is due to an increase in premarital sexual activity and disruptions in access to contraceptive services resulting from rapid urbanization.

per 1,000 in Western Europe, where abortion is generally permitted on broad grounds. • Where abortion is permitted on broad legal grounds, it is generally safe, and where it is highly restricted, it is typically unsafe. In developing countries, relatively liberal abortion laws are associated with fewer negative health consequences from unsafe abortion than are highly restrictive laws. • In South Africa, where the abortion law was liberalized in 1997, the annual number of abortion-related deaths fell by 91% between 1994 and 1998–2001. • In Nepal, where abortion was made legal on broad grounds in 2002, it appears that abortion-related complications are on the decline: A recent study in eight districts found that abortion-related complications accounted for 54% of all facility-treated maternal illnesses in 1998, but for only 28% in 2008–2009. • Between 1997 and 2008, the grounds on which abortion may be legally performed were broadened in 17 countries: Benin, Bhutan, Cambodia, Chad, Colombia, Ethiopia, Guinea, Iran, Mali, Nepal, Niger, Portugal, Saint Lucia, Swaziland, Switzerland, Thailand and Togo. Mexico City and parts of Australia (Capital Territory, Victoria, Tasmania and Western Australia) also liberalized their abortion laws. In contrast, El Salvador and Nicaragua changed their already restrictive laws to prohibit abortion entirely, while Poland withdrew socioeconomic reasons as a legal ground for abortion.

UNSAFE ABORTION
• The World Health Organization defines unsafe abortion as a procedure for terminating a pregnancy that is performed by an individual lacking the necessary skills, or in an environment that does not conform to minimal medical standards, or both. • Between 1995 and 2008, the rate of unsafe abortion worldwide remained essentially unchanged, at 14 abortions per 1,000 women aged 15–44. • During the same period, the proportion of all abortions that were unsafe increased from 44% to 49%. • In 2008, more than 97% of abortions in Africa were unsafe. Southern Africa is the subregion with the lowest proportion of unsafe abortions (58%). Close to 90% of women in the subregion live in South Africa, where abortion was liberalized in 1997. • In Latin America, 95% of abortions were unsafe, a proportion that did not change between 1995 and 2008. Nearly all safe abortions occurred in the Caribbean, primarily in Cuba and several other islands where the law is liberal and safe abortions are accessible. • In Asia, the proportion of abortions that are unsafe varies widely by subregion, from virtually none in Eastern Asia to 65% in South Central Asia. • In Western Asia, the proportion of abortions that are unsafe increased from 34% to 60% between 2003 and 2008. This increase is likely due to improved measurement of unsafe abortions and to a

steady decline in abortions (partly due to the increasingly widespread use of effective contraceptives) in countries where abortion is legal and safe. • Worldwide, medication abortion (a technique using a combination of the drugs mifespristone and misoprostol, or misoprostol alone) has become more common in both legal and clandestine procedures. Increased use of medication abortion has likely contributed to declines in the proportion of clandestine abortions that result in severe morbidity and maternal death.

CONSEQUENCES OF UNSAFE ABORTION
• The estimated annual number of deaths from unsafe abortion declined from 56,000 in 2003 to 47,000 in 2008. Complications from unsafe abortion accounted for an estimated 13% of all maternal deaths worldwide in both years. • Declines since 2003 in the annual number of deaths from unsafe abortion, along with concurrent increases in the annual number of unsafe abortions performed, indicate that the risks associated with clandestine procedures may be decreasing. • In the United States, legal induced abortion results in only 0.6 deaths per 100,000 procedures. Worldwide, unsafe abortion accounts for a death rate that is 350 times higher (220 per 100,000), and, in Sub-Saharan Africa, the rate is 800 times higher, at 460 per 100,000. • Almost all abortion-related deaths occur in developing countries, with the highest number occurring in Africa.

ABORTION LAW
• Highly restrictive abortion laws are not associated with lower abortion rates. For example, the abortion rate is 29 per 1,000 women of childbearing age in Africa and 32 per 1,000 in Latin America—regions in which abortion is illegal under most circumstances in the majority of countries. The rate is 12
Induced Abortion Worldwide

2

Guttmacher Institute

• Unsafe abortion is a significant cause of ill-health among women in the developing world. Estimates for 2005 indicate that 8.5 million women annually experience complications from unsafe abortion that require medical attention, and three million do not receive the care they need. • Treating medical complications from unsafe abortion places a significant financial burden on public health care systems in the developing world. According to a 2009 study, the minimum annual estimated cost of providing postabortion care in the developing world is $341 million. • In developing countries, poor women have the least access to family planning services and the fewest resources to pay for safe abortion procedures; they are also the most likely to experience complications related to unsafe abortion. • Unsafe abortion has significant negative consequences beyond its immediate effects on women’s health. For example, complications from unsafe abortion may reduce women’s productivity, increasing the economic burden on poor families; cause maternal deaths that leave children motherless; cause long-term health problems, such as infertility; and result in considerable costs to already struggling public health systems.

UNINTENDED PREGNANCY: THE ROOT OF ABORTION
• The uptake of modern contraceptive methods worldwide has slowed in recent years, from an increase of 0.6 percentage points per year in 1990–1999 to an increase of only 0.1 percentage points per year in 2000–2009. In Africa, the annual increase in modern contraceptive use fell from 0.8 percentage points in 1990– 1999 to 0.2 percentage points in 2000–2009. • An estimated 215 million women in the developing world have an unmet need for modern contraceptives, meaning they want to avoid a pregnancy but are using a low-efficacy traditional family planning method or no method. • Some 82% of unintended pregnancies in developing countries occur among women who have an unmet need for modern contraception. • In the developing world, women’s reasons for not using contraceptives most commonly include concerns about possible side-effects, the belief that they are not at risk of getting pregnant, poor access to family planning, and their partners’ opposition to contraception. • Reducing unmet need for modern contraception is an effective way to prevent unintended pregnancies, abortions and unplanned births.

Most data in this fact sheet is from Sedgh G et al., Induced abortion: incidence and trends worldwide from 1995 to 2008, Lancet, 2012, (forthcoming), and the World Health Organization. Additional sources can be found in the fully annotated version, available at http://www.guttmacher. org/pubs/fb_IAW.html and at www.who.int/topics/reproductive_ health/en/.

Guttmacher Institute

3

Induced Abortion Worldwide

Advancing sexual and reproductive health worldwide through research, policy analysis and public education New York 125 Maiden Lane, New York, NY 10038 Tel: 212.248.1111, Fax: 212.248.1951 info@guttmacher.org Washington D.C. 1301 Connecticut Avenue, N.W., Suite 700, Washington, DC 20036 Tel: 202.296.4012, Fax: 202.223.5756 policyinfo@guttmacher.org

Department of Reproductive Health and Research World Health Organization 1211 Geneva 27 Switzerland Tel: 41.22.791.3372 rhrpublications@who.int

www.guttmacher.org
January 2012

Similar Documents

Premium Essay

Abortion

...Ethical Issues of Abortion “Abortion is termination of pregnancy by the removal or expulsion from the uterus of a fetus or embryo prior viability” (Wikipedia). Abortions can occur spontaneously which is called miscarriage, or it could be induced. When people talk about abortion, they mostly refer to the induced abortion. According to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website, approximately forty- two million abortions occur in this world per year averaging to 115,000 abortions per day. Eighty-three percent of these abortions occur in underdeveloped countries. In United States of America, one third of the women before the age of forty-five, have abortions. The average abortion per day in United States of America is 3,700. Eighty-eight percent of abortions are found in first trimester; fifty-nine percent of abortion is done in first eight weeks of pregnancy. Non-Hispanic white women had the largest percentage of abortions rate of (37.1%), followed by non-Hispanic black women (34.4%), Hispanic women (22.1%) (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention). Whenever it comes to abortion, people talk about Pro-Life vs. Pro Choice. Pro-life is when a person believes that the “government has an obligation to preserve all human life regardless of intent or quality of life” (Head). Pro Choice is when “individuals have unlimited autonomy with respect to their own reproductive systems as long as they do not breach the autonomy of others” (Head). Whatever side a person takes, it...

Words: 1945 - Pages: 8

Premium Essay

Abortion

...“Pro-choice Abortion” Abortion has been one of the biggest controversies of all time. Many people believe it is immoral and even consider it to be murder. The definition of abortion is; “The termination of pregnancy by the removal or expulsion from the uterus of a fetus or embryo prior to being capable of normal growth.” 1 These pro-life believers do not support the idea of induced abortion and believe it should be illegal. Many of these supporters do not know that if abortion were illegal they would still be performed, unfortunately by an uneducated staffs. Over 70 thousand maternal deaths occur every year because of unsafe abortions1. These women die, so the idea of supporting pro-life is contradictory, this is why the nation should be pro-choice. Pro-choice believers support the right to privacy and the idea women should have the choice to do what she pleases with her own body. As an example; a woman is raped by a man and becomes pregnant with his child. She decides she doesn’t want to keep the baby; she has an abortion because the idea of raising a child of her rapist is too painful for her to cope with. Pro-choice defenders take sympathies to this woman while she then gets called a murderer by pro-life supporters. Abortions sometimes results in the woman being harassed because of the choice she has made about her own body. That’s what pro-life supports. Often time’s situations like this turns into harassment which can be considered to be part of anti-abortion violence1....

Words: 3628 - Pages: 15

Premium Essay

Abortion

...increasing number of abortion cases throughout the world. This scenario has been fuelled by among other factors social and economic factors. Abortion is the termination of pregnancy. It is the removal of the foetus before it is viable. It is usually done before the foetus gets to 25 weeks old. It is either spontaneous or induced abortion. Abortion refers to the induced type (Malcolm 1977 page 12). In developed countries, abortion is legal whereas most developing countries do not encourage and permit abortion. This brings about the differences in safe and unsafe abortions. Abortion accounts for over 70,000 maternal deaths worldwide. Abortion has a long history. In the past, it was done using crude tools such as sharpened tools, physical trauma and other traditional methods. With advancement in the field of medicine, contemporary methods are now used and involve the use of medication and surgical procedures (Nada 1998 page 61). Each country in the world has different legality, cultural and religious statuses and prevalence of abortion. The ethical principles towards abortion and removal of pregnancies also vary. Countries such as the United States of America and Britain have heated politics surrounding the issue of abortion in pro-life and pro-choice campaigns (Ted 1995 page 66). These are based on the argument that for one group, it should be legalized and for the other, abortion should not. Most governments in the developed countries have legalized abortion. Many developing...

Words: 2367 - Pages: 10

Premium Essay

Abortion

...Problems Abortion In society we as people have standard behavior or beliefs concerning what is and is not acceptable and that is called morals. Sometimes we like to believe what’s right is wrong and what’s wrong is right. The pre-conventional level of moral development reasoning is especially common in children, although adults can also exhibit this level of reasoning. Abortion is the most controversial topic of our generation. It is an on-going fight between pro-life and pro-choice. Many people believe that is wrong while others are the total opposite. A person must first be informed about the history of abortion, in order to understand and form an opinion. The different methods of abortion being performed today, and the potential side affects are equally debatable sides. I believe the government shouldn’t decide what a woman does with her own body. This is one of those topics that can go on for day’s maybe weeks and months without settling anything. Before making any decision is best to be informed about all these important issues, therefore, you’ll know where you stand. Abortion has been legal in the United States from the time the earliest settlers arrived. It has been performed for thousands of years where woman would help each other to abort. Britain first passed anti-abortion laws in 1803, throughout the century the law became stricter. Most abortions were illegal in the United States by 1880, except those who were necessary to save the life of the woman. Anti-abortion laws...

Words: 2072 - Pages: 9

Premium Essay

Abortion

...Abortion Abortion is the termination of pregnancy before the fetus is able to survive without depending on the mother. The loss of this is usually referred to as premature birth. Abortion is one of the most common medical procedures performed in many countries today. In some countries abortion is legalized while in others this is a criminal offence that can lead to prosecution. Globally, each year, 20 to 30 million legal abortions are performed while 10 to 20million illegal abortions do take place (Gnad, 2008). Abortions in most parts of the world are unsafe and, account for many deaths of women due to, many complication involved. In spite of modern, effective and readily available birth control methods, more than half of the pregnancies that happen in the world today are mostly unplanned. Many of these pregnancies end up in abortion. This has made abortion, a pertinent issue that this paper tries to discuss about. Firstly, abortion in the world today comes in many types. Abortion performed before the end of seven weeks from the time of conception is usually done surgically or by use of drugs. From nine weeks to fourteen weeks, abortion is usually performed by a procedure known as dilatation and suction curettage. After fourteen weeks, abortion is performed using a procedure referred to as dilatation and evacuation procedure (Michael, 2000). After expiry of 20 weeks after conception, abortion can only be performed by labor induction, saline infusion or hysterectomy. Medical...

Words: 699 - Pages: 3

Premium Essay

Abortion

...The argument over whether abortion should be legal is an ongoing debate. Although abortion has been legalized over the majority of the U.S., many people are still against it. Abortion should be legal because it gives the woman the right to choose. At times there may be several factors that affect the woman’s decision. Women that are pregnant due to rape may prefer to have an abortion. A woman may not be financially stable, or may be pregnant with a malformed fetus, or the pregnancy could cause them health issues and they may want to have an abortion. Making abortion illegal cannot stop illegal abortions which are very unsafe. Abortion should remain the decision of the mother. Women that are pregnant because they were raped should have the right to terminate their pregnancy. Rape victims may experience many mental problems which can interfere with their parenting. The baby will always be a reminder of what they went through. Some women may be able to handle this, while it could be too much for others. The victim may be exposed to harmful germs and diseases from the predator. The baby could possibly be born with diseases. The baby will also have to be raised without their real father, and one day possibly learns the truth. Women who have been diagnosed with a malformed fetus should have the right to choose abortion. The child could be born with a birth defect. This could cause the child to never have a normal life. The birth defect could possibly cause the...

Words: 906 - Pages: 4

Premium Essay

Abortion

...SHOULD ABORTION BE LEGAL? By MARY W. DOUGLAS FINAL PAPER PHL-103INFORMAL LOGIC ANTHONY BIDUCK-INSTRUCTOR SEPTEMBER 8, 2013 Final Paper DouglasM1 Thesis The definition of abortion is the induced termination of a pregnancy followed by the death of the embryo or fetus. The paper is presented on the moral issues of Abortion. Should abortion be legal? As today’s society becomes more open-minded to an issue normally handled behind closed doors being performed by persons with no medical degree whatsoever, the choice should be left to the individual whether or not to have an abortion. Abortion is an eight letter word that has become a label that society applies to the procedure in which a pregnancy is purposely ended for many reasons. Let us examine the subject of legalizing abortion. Argument Abortion has been a very controversial topic for many years. With women’s rights to vote, the right to burn their bras if they wanted to, and the right to eliminate a developing fetus from a woman’s body has become a great debate. Abortion is a subject that questions the morals of an individual and their decision as to whether to have one or not. Moral philosophy has always investigated the rules and principles...

Words: 2933 - Pages: 12

Premium Essay

Abortion

...Abortion: A Never Ending Controversy Approximately 205 million abortions occur each year worldwide. Over a third are unintended and about a fifth end in abortion. What is abortion? Abortion is the termination of pregnancy by the removal or expulsion from the uterus of a fetus prior to viability. In other words, it is when a mother decides she doesn’t want to go through with her pregnancy. Abortion in today’s society has become very political. You are either pro-choice, pro-life, and there doesn’t seem to be a happy medium. As we look at abortion and research its history, should it remain legal in the United States, or should it be outlawed, we must consider both points of views. November 14, 1979, with the temperature outside at fifteen degrees, a two pound baby girl was found in a field wrapped up in a wet, dirty, old shirt. The umbilical cord was still attached, and the baby had been aborted twelve weeks prematurely. With little chance of survival, the baby was taken to a medical center. The little girl survived surgery and other efforts to save her. The baby was later adopted by Susan Morrison, one of the nurses who attended to her. The baby was named Christelle, and now she and her mother talk to thousands of people about abortion and the pro-life movement. There are 1,600,000 other abortion stories every year in the United States. “Abortion is the termination of pregnancy after, accompanied by, resulting in, or closely followed by death of the embryo or fetus. Because...

Words: 2773 - Pages: 12

Premium Essay

Abortion

...Abortion is defined as the termination of pregnancy by the removal or expulsion from the uterus of a fetus or embryo prior toviability.[note 1] An abortion can occur spontaneously, in which case it is usually called a miscarriage, or it can be purposely induced. The term abortion most commonly refers to the induced abortion of a human pregnancy. Abortion, when induced in the developed world in accordance with local law, is among the safest procedures in medicine.[1] However,unsafe abortions result in approximately 70 thousand maternal deaths and 5 million disabilities per year globally.[2] An estimated 44 million abortions are performed globally each year, with slightly under half of those performed unsafely.[3] The incidence of abortion has stabilized in recent years,[3] having previously spent decades declining as access to family planning education and contraceptiveservices increased.[4] Forty percent of the world's women have access to induced abortions (within gestational limits).[5] Induced abortion has a long history and has been facilitated by various methods including herbal abortifacients, the use of sharpened tools, physical trauma, and other traditional methods. Contemporary medicine utilizes medications and surgical procedures to induce abortion. The legality, prevalence, cultural and religious status of abortion vary substantially around the world. In many parts of the world there is prominent and divisive public controversy over the ethical and legal issues of...

Words: 683 - Pages: 3

Premium Essay

Abortion

...Abortion Thou shall not murder is one of the Ten Commandments from the Bible. Is a mother's right to choose considered murder? Several states in our country still allow the capital punishment for criminals who have committed heinous crimes. We, as a nation however, have moved on to the innocent and the unborn. It seems that our culture in today's time is strictly based on convenience. So why shouldn't terminating pregnancies be the same as committing murder? First of all, I would like to provide some interesting facts on abortion. Abortion became legal in the United States in 1973 with the landmark decision in Roe versus Wade. According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and the Guttmacher Institute (AGI), there were 1.21 million abortions in the United States in 2008, which is the most recent data available. Abortion is the most common outpatient surgical procedure currently performed as noted by the Abortion Clinic Services. The leading state in the nation in the number of abortions in 2008 was New York, followed by Florida and Texas. The annual number of legal abortions doubled between 1973 and 1978 and peaked in 1990. There was a slow but steady decline in the number of legal abortions in the 1990s. There was then a 3.7% decrease in the number of abortions from 2000 to 2008. Nearly half of the number of pregnancies in American women are unintended with approximately 40% of those ending in abortion. According to AGI, 22% of all United States pregnancies end in...

Words: 942 - Pages: 4

Premium Essay

Abortion

...ABORTION An abortion is when the pregnancy is ended so that it does not result in the birth of a child. Sometimes this is called ‘termination of pregnancy’. The pregnancy is removed from the womb, either by taking pills (medical abortion) which involves taking medicines to cause a miscarriage or by surgery (surgical abortion) where the pregnancy is removed from the womb. Abortion is the termination of pregnancy by the removal or expulsion from the uterus of afetus or embryo prior to viability. An abortion can occur spontaneously, in which case it is usually called a miscarriage, or it can be purposely induced. The term abortionmost commonly refers to the induced abortion of a human pregnancy. Abortion, when induced in the developed world in accordance with local law, is among the safest procedures in medicine. However, unsafe abortions result in approximately 70,000maternal deaths and 5 million hospital admissions per year globally. An estimated 44 million abortions are performed globally each year, with slightly under half of those performed unsafely. The incidence of abortion has stabilized in recent years, having previously spent decades declining as access to family planning education and contraceptive services increased. Forty percent of the world's women have access to legal induced abortions (within gestational limits). Induced abortion has a long history and has been performed by various methods, including herbal abortifacients, the use of sharpened tools, physical...

Words: 1092 - Pages: 5

Premium Essay

Abortion

...ILLEGALIZE ABORTION By: Abirna Senthilkaruniyan “I feel the greatest destroyer of peace today is 'Abortion', because it is a war against the child... A direct killing of the innocent child, 'Murder' by the mother herself...”― Mother Teresa. In the twenty first century, laws have changed to establish equality to both men and women in developed nations. The act of abortion, ‘is the removal of an embryo or fetus from the uterus in order to end a pregnancy.’ This act became legal in the United States of America in 1973 after the Supreme Court case of Roe vs. Wade. In North America, it is legal to abort a child twenty weeks after conception. The government will permit a woman to have a late-abortion for the following reasons: “(1) if the woman has a serious disease, (2) the pregnancy could endanger her physical/mental health, (3) the continuation of pregnancy could lead to substantial risk to the newborn, (4) if the pregnancy was the result of rape (5) if the socio-economic status of the mother hampers the progress of a healthy pregnancy, (6) if the contraceptive device irrespective of the method used failed.” However, other than the respectable mediums listed above abortion should be abolished. Due to the law, abortion is now a risk to the economy and its future, it also increases the rates of murder and can negatively impact a woman psychologically. If North American countries want to sustain humanity and to continue being economical contributors, influencers and advisors...

Words: 1495 - Pages: 6

Premium Essay

Abortion

...The Tragedy of Teenage Abortion In society today, teens are taught by the television and the media that pre-marital sex is not a bad thing. This problem is leading to many teenage pregnancies, that then lead to abortion. All over the world teens are faced with many challenges in their everyday lives. Sex is being portrayed as extremely appealing in the media, but what they don't show is the pregnancies and the unborn child that never asked to be created in the first place that is being discarded. Abortion is in no way acceptable, it is murder of an unborn child. Many doctors will say that abortion is not a bad thing, and it's not murder. They have argued that it is just an embryo, and is not yet a child. In the book The Terrible Choice: The Abortion Dilemma, Glanville Williams, a well-known English criminologist, was quoted saying abortion should be treated like a tonsillectomy. It's a minor operation to remove unwanted or harmful "tissue growth". Both tissues are alive, and contain material substances, chemical compounds, DNA and RNA molecules. They may vary a little, but they are mainly matter which is composed of cells which are composed of chemicals (1-2). The only difference between a tonsillectomy and an abortion is that the fetus can grow and develop into a human being much like ourselves. Joseph Farah wrote an article about abortion in The Human Life Review. In this, she quoted Steven Pinker, a professor of psychology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology...

Words: 1532 - Pages: 7

Premium Essay

Abortion

...first point out the fact that abortion is one of the most controversial issues in the United States. The progressive left stands strong on the argument that women deserve the sole right to decide on abortion. As for the conservative right they base their judgment of abortion on religious aspects than on women’s rights. Whether your stance on abortion is pro or anti it is a legal operation in the United States. In the year 1973 abortion laws were decided by the states. Most of the states banned legal abortion unless the woman’s life was at risk. The controversial case Roe v. Wade changed the outlook on abortion. “In that year, the U.S. Supreme Court decided the controversial case Roe v. Wade. The Roe decision acknowledged both a woman’s ‘fundamental right’ to terminate a pregnancy before fetal viability and the state’s legitimate interest in protecting both the women’s health and the ‘potential’ of the fetus. It prohibited states from banning abortion to protect the fetus before the third trimester of a pregnancy, and it ruled that even during that final trimester, a woman could obtain an abortion if she could prove that her life or health would be endangered by carrying the term”(Gordon, 214). This ruling gave woman the ability to make a decision of aborting a child based on their own rights and beliefs. As of 1973 to the present year of 2003 abortion is a legal procedure but is unfortunately looked upon by some, as murder. My standpoint on abortion is developed by both the progressive...

Words: 768 - Pages: 4

Premium Essay

Abortion

...Abortion has been and still is a very controversial issue. The Supreme Court case Roe v. Wade in 1973 truly brought the issue of abortion to the public eye for the first time. For those who don’t know, abortion is defined as, “ the deliberate termination of a human pregnancy”. The most common types of in-clinic abortions are called aspiration and dilation and evacuation (D&E). Aspirations are when a small tube is inserted into the cervix and the fetus is gently vacuumed from the uterus. A D&E is almost the same procedure, except medical instruments are used alongside the vacuuming. In pregnancies late into the second trimester (6 months since conception), a shot may be given through the abdomen of the woman so the fetus’ heart is stopped before the procedure begins. Aspirations are typically performed up to the first 16 weeks of pregnancy, and D&E is usually performed after the first 16 weeks. Both types are very quick. Aspirations take about 5-10 minutes while D&E’s take about 10-20 minutes. Both methods are almost guaranteed to work. There are many reasons to get an abortion, and abortion should always be legal. The classic argument for those that are pro-abortion (pro-choice) is that it is the woman’s right to choose whether she has an abortion or not, hence why those that favor abortion are referred to being pro-choice. A woman should definitely have the option to have an abortion, and denying women the right to have an abortion would be a social injustice. It’s her body...

Words: 1004 - Pages: 5