Half U.S. abortions are repeats for women
SuzannePjam
Posts: 411
Half U.S. abortions are repeats for women
Most were over 30 and were using contraception at the time, study finds
WASHINGTON - About half of all U.S. women who had abortions in 2002 had undergone at least one previous abortion, according to a study released Tuesday.
Women who had repeat abortions tended to be over age 30 and to have more children, and most were using contraception at the time, the report from the nonprofit Alan Guttmacher Institute found.
The Institute used several different surveys by both the government and private groups to come up with its estimate. For instance, in one 2001-2002 government survey, 48 percent of women having abortions said they had undergone a previous abortion.
“This suggests that we need to do a better job helping all women better prevent unwanted pregnancies, so they can avoid having to decide whether to seek abortions or raise children they are not prepared for,” said Rachel Jones, a senior research associate who helped lead the study.
Most of the women seeking abortions were poor or low-income, and 60 percent had at least one child already.
The study also found that one in three U.S. women have given birth to a baby they had not planned for, and one in 10 have had more than one unintended birth.
The Institute, named for the founder of the Planned Parenthood Foundation of America, said women getting abortions should be counseled on how to use contraception effectively, but this opportunity is being missed.
'Wall of separation'
“The 'wall of separation’ that the federal government has erected between family planning and abortion services is, paradoxically, leading to more abortions,” said Sharon Camp, the Institute’s president and chief executive officer.
“These policies interfere with the ability of abortion providers to ensure continuity of care for their patients by guaranteeing that, following an abortion, every woman has an appropriate contraceptive method and is able to use it consistently,” Camp added in a statement.
For example, the Institute said, Colorado, Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania will not give any clinic state family planning funding if it has any relationship with an abortion provider.
And federal Title X-funded family planning programs must maintain a “wall of separation” between their programs and abortion providers.
Half of pregnancies are unintended
According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about half of the approximately 5.4 million pregnancies in the United States each year are unintended. More than 4.1 million babies are born in the United States each year.
The CDC has also found that 98 percent of women of reproductive age have used one or more contraceptive methods and 73 percent of women aged 15 to 44 years visited a doctor or clinic for family planning services in 2002.
The CDC said 854,122 legal induced abortions were reported to it in 2002, a number that has been fairly stable after falling steadily from 1996 to 2001.
Globally, 46 million women have abortions each year, with the highest rates in Romania, Cuba and Vietnam and the lowest rates in Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany and Switzerland.
Copyright 2006 Reuters Limited.
Most were over 30 and were using contraception at the time, study finds
WASHINGTON - About half of all U.S. women who had abortions in 2002 had undergone at least one previous abortion, according to a study released Tuesday.
Women who had repeat abortions tended to be over age 30 and to have more children, and most were using contraception at the time, the report from the nonprofit Alan Guttmacher Institute found.
The Institute used several different surveys by both the government and private groups to come up with its estimate. For instance, in one 2001-2002 government survey, 48 percent of women having abortions said they had undergone a previous abortion.
“This suggests that we need to do a better job helping all women better prevent unwanted pregnancies, so they can avoid having to decide whether to seek abortions or raise children they are not prepared for,” said Rachel Jones, a senior research associate who helped lead the study.
Most of the women seeking abortions were poor or low-income, and 60 percent had at least one child already.
The study also found that one in three U.S. women have given birth to a baby they had not planned for, and one in 10 have had more than one unintended birth.
The Institute, named for the founder of the Planned Parenthood Foundation of America, said women getting abortions should be counseled on how to use contraception effectively, but this opportunity is being missed.
'Wall of separation'
“The 'wall of separation’ that the federal government has erected between family planning and abortion services is, paradoxically, leading to more abortions,” said Sharon Camp, the Institute’s president and chief executive officer.
“These policies interfere with the ability of abortion providers to ensure continuity of care for their patients by guaranteeing that, following an abortion, every woman has an appropriate contraceptive method and is able to use it consistently,” Camp added in a statement.
For example, the Institute said, Colorado, Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania will not give any clinic state family planning funding if it has any relationship with an abortion provider.
And federal Title X-funded family planning programs must maintain a “wall of separation” between their programs and abortion providers.
Half of pregnancies are unintended
According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about half of the approximately 5.4 million pregnancies in the United States each year are unintended. More than 4.1 million babies are born in the United States each year.
The CDC has also found that 98 percent of women of reproductive age have used one or more contraceptive methods and 73 percent of women aged 15 to 44 years visited a doctor or clinic for family planning services in 2002.
The CDC said 854,122 legal induced abortions were reported to it in 2002, a number that has been fairly stable after falling steadily from 1996 to 2001.
Globally, 46 million women have abortions each year, with the highest rates in Romania, Cuba and Vietnam and the lowest rates in Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany and Switzerland.
Copyright 2006 Reuters Limited.
"Where there is sacrifice there is someone collecting the sacrificial offerings."-- Ayn Rand
"Some of my friends sit around every evening and they worry about the times ahead,
But everybody else is overwhelmed by indifference and the promise of an early bed..."-- Elvis Costello
"Some of my friends sit around every evening and they worry about the times ahead,
But everybody else is overwhelmed by indifference and the promise of an early bed..."-- Elvis Costello
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Comments
"What I lack in decorum, I make up for with an absence of tact."
Camden 5-28-06
Washington, D.C. 6-22-08
kind of a discouraging statistic. at the same time, i dont see where in the article it supports its contention that most were on birth control at the time. that is a significant point and one that is important to the debate.
when it hits you, you feel to pain.
So brutalize me with music.”
~ Bob Marley
yes. the parts of my post that you cut from your quote explain why. you get a president willing to include information on proper use of birth control in sex ed in public schools, and abortions drop. you get a president who only funds abstinence education programs, abortion rates turn around. it's not rocket science. you can't have it both ways. people are going to fuck. so if preventing abortion is a huge priority for you, teach them how to fuck without getting pregnant instead of simply telling them not to fuck.
Not to mention a president who puts a person who opposes birth control for even married women in charge of family planning. expect the rate to rise with thinking like that.
Have we lost our way tonight?
Have we lost our hope to sorrow?
Feels like were all alone
Running further from what’s right
And there are no more heroes to follow
So what are we becoming?
Where did we go wrong?
becos they are unaware there are necessary steps. did you read the article? aboriton providers are not allowed to talk about contraception and vice versa. for some reason, the christian right thinks telling people abotu condoms will turn all our women into whores. a lot of people out there (men and women) simply dont KNOW about contraception becos idiots like bush decide we should pretend it doesn't exist lest our teenagers actually use it.
also, this is why im wondering where that missing statistic is. the headline seems to imply that most people who have a second abortion were on birth control or using contraception when they got pregnant. that's not foolish, it's just bad luck.
Abortion is often a crushing decision for a woman, and I feel like that fact is overlooked in the debate. Sure, there are some sociopaths who get abortions like the rest of us get coffee in the morning, but for the majority of women, and all of the ones that I know, it's a terrible ordeal...emotionally traumatizing.
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Are you serious??? Women in their 30's are "unaware" of the necessary steps to prevent pregnancy? I don't buy that for one second. Maybe young kids but not grown women. You'd have to live under a rock these days to not know how to prevent getting pregnant. I'd guess that 90% of people that have abortions know about condoms...I was talking to a young girl (23) in Singapore the other day about contraceptives. She said she doesn't use anything except the pulling out method. Her boyfriend "used" to use condoms but he just kinda stopped and she's not on the pill. I gave her this big lecture about unsafe sex and she said "I know about the consequences". This is a girl that still lives at home and collects goth dolls and stuff. She should not be taking a chance on getting pregnant. But she's just irresponsible.
this is exactly why I have a hard time taking such a strong stance against it. me personally, am against abortion. I think killing a baby for sometimes not even having a reason is wrong. but I never have to make that desicion. I will never deal with the mental pain of knowing or the mental and physical stress of actually having a baby.
I truly think that when we are gone and the next civilization is reading about us on the walls of their museums, they will look back in shock (and awe) about the mass murder of our children.
it's a sad, sad legacy...and it's all of ours...I'm in a bad mood.
(you can't see me, so do you think I have a striaght face?)
Or maybe if people started acting responsibly. But the cahnces of that are slim and none because there is always an easy way (or easier way) out of almost everything.
That's ludacrous.
"What I lack in decorum, I make up for with an absence of tact."
Camden 5-28-06
Washington, D.C. 6-22-08
But some people don't. And you can't get around it. There are 300 million people in the US alone and while you can reach some of them, you can't reach them all.
If you think we can make birth control taboo (which I don't know that you do) and expect people not to get knocked up, you are just not in the real world. My comment related to birth control more than abortion.
im guessing they get better sex ed in singapore than her, which is pretty fucked up.
im not blaming bush, im blaming cultural conservatives who feel the best sex ed is the kind that pretends contraception doesn't exist, or if it does it doesn't work and then tells kids the ONLY option is abstinence. that's fucking ridiculous.
im disturbed that she just lets this guy do it. im more disturbed that he just stopped using condoms. why? my guess... it doesn't feel as good and he knows he can abandon her if she gets knocked up and she's fucked. you give me a comperhensive plan for holding every male accountable for every child he produces, and ill bend on abortion. as it is, you're placing all the consequences on the women and giving men a total free pass when it comes to sex. but that's the way we like it in america... boys will be boys and girls will stay in the kitchen so they dont become whores.
I'm with you on the birth control...I'm for just about anything within reason to help eliminate any and all abortions.
There are sooooo many good topics that we could teach in our schools that would really make a difference...but parents are too afraid to let their kids think for themselves.
Many people are unaware. There are some people that grow up with parents that are just ill-equipped. Then they go to schools where the whole concept of protection and birth control is taboo.
So instead we want to talk about responsibility so if someone does the crime (sex) they have to do the time (parenting, the females anyway). Then we tell the baby, who's life we have just "saved" to pull himself up by his boot straps and don't get sick, because there is no way you are ever going to have health insurance.
when it hits you, you feel to pain.
So brutalize me with music.”
~ Bob Marley
Spreading lies? The child will have health insurance.
...are those who've helped us.
Right 'round the corner could be bigger than ourselves.
cos you can't oppress reason. hard as the cons try, they cant shut down the spread of information. i bet it'd drop even more if we enacted comprehensive sex ed.
i suppose you prefer abstinence-only education? maybe we ought to teach them masturbation gives them hairy palms... anything to keep our kids from becoming perverts right?
Given there is a drop in teen pregnancy rates you could easily say that Bush's policies are working. The abortion figures of women in their 20's and 30's just show what a failure Clinton's policies were. As these are the women who were taking sex education based on Clinton's policies.
when it hits you, you feel to pain.
So brutalize me with music.”
~ Bob Marley
when it hits you, you feel to pain.
So brutalize me with music.”
~ Bob Marley
that's why i want to see that missing statistic. the headline implies women in their 20s or 30s that have a second abortion were on contraception when they got pregnant. that is cause for concern.
what do you do for the vast number of kids whose parents arent home? who dont have parents? who are in foster care? those are the kids mostly likely to get pregnant as a teenager. you'd be leaving them high and dry.
when it hits you, you feel to pain.
So brutalize me with music.”
~ Bob Marley
How? Health insurance will be forever tied to his parents jobs. Sure, some will have health insurance, but tons of kids grow up without it.