I appreciated Slack Inc.'s recent attempt to discuss abortion which unfortunately got derailed into a pissing match between two of this site's most prominent pissers. I had wanted to use that diary to get into a discussion of abortion statistics but felt that it would probably deserve it's own diary. Follow the jump and see if it does...
One thing that always troubles me in the abortion debate is the repeated point that 1.3 million abortions happen every year and that something like 30 million or so abortions have taken place since 1973. Where did these statistics come from? Are they true or made up to help the anti-Choice crowd win the public debate?
Doing a Google search (they still have the St. Pat's graphic up, are they too hung over to change it or what?), I found the About.com site which had an overview of abortion statistics I'd like to share with you:
Abortion Statistics - U.S.
Approximately 1,370,000 abortions occur annually in the U.S. according to the Alan Guttmacher Institute. In 2001, 1.31 million abortions took place.
88% of abortions occur during the first 6 to 12 weeks of pregnancy.
60% of abortions are performed on women who already have one or more children.
47% of abortions are performed on women who have already had one or more abortions.
43% of women will have had at least one abortion by the time they are 45 years old.
Abortion Statistics - Demographics *
52% are younger than 25 years old and 19% are teenagers. The abortion rate is highest for those women aged 18 to 19 (56 per 1,000 in 1992.)
Marriage - 51% of women who are unmarried when they become pregnant will receive an abortion. Unmarried women are 6 times more likely than married women to have an abortion. 67% of abortions are from women who have never been married.
Race - 63% of abortion patients are white, however, black women are more than 3 times as likely to have an abortion, and Hispanic women are 2.5 times as likely.
Religion - 43% of women getting an abortion claimed they were Protestant, while 27% claimed they were Catholic.
*Abortion Statistics - Decisions to Have an Abortion (U.S.)
25.5% of women deciding to have an abortion want to postpone childbearing.
21.3% of women cannot afford a baby.
14.1% of women have a relationship issue or their partner does not want a child.
12.2% of women are too young (their parents or others object to the pregnancy.)
10.8% of women feel a child will disrupt their education or career.
7.9% of women want no (more) children.
3.3% of women have an abortion due to a risk to fetal health.
2.8% of women have an abortion due to a risk to maternal health.
Abortion Statistics - Using Contraception (U.S.) *
54% of women having an abortion said they used some form of contraception during the month they became pregnant.
90% of women who are at risk for unplanned pregnancies are using contraception
8% of women having an abortion say they have never used contraception.
It is possible that up to 43% of the decline in abortion from 1994-2000 can be attributed to using emergency contraception.
*Abortion Statistics - Pro-Life vs. Pro-Choice
According to a USA Today, CNN Gallup Poll in May, 1999 - 16% of Americans believe abortion should be legal for any reason at any time during pregnancy and 55% of American believe abortion should be legal only to save the life of the mother or in cases of rape or incest.
According to a Gallup Poll in January, 2001 - People who considered themselves to be pro-life rose from 33% to 43% in the past 5 years, and people who considered themselves to be pro-choice declined from 56% to 48%.
The majority of these statistics were taken from The Alan Guttmacher Institute.
So, from what I can tell, almost half of all women having abortion are Protestants while over a quarter were Catholic! Most women that have abortions use contraceptives and tend to be young and poor and simply cannot afford to have a baby (I wonder if they even have insurance since abortions are cheaper than giving birth perhaps this might also be an explanataion- another reason to pressure the right to support universal health insurance). I think these statistics help point out several of the false assumptions that most people accept. I also love the fact that the the drop in abortions is attributed to emergency contraception- something that the right is trying to do away with which would actually increase the number of abortions which is more proof to me that anti-abortion people are actually more about establishing a culture of control than a "culture of life."
Are these statistics believable? From what little I could find, many sites accuse the Guttmacher Institute of being pro-choice? Does anyone have more info on this? Has anyone else ever done a study of abortion rates? I still find the number of abortions in this study a bit high to be believed and think this one statistic of over 1 million abortions a year hurts the cause of choice more than anything else. Discuss...