A liberal abortion-tracking group reports that the near three-decade decline in abortions has reversed course, going up one percent from about 1.2 million abortions in the United States in 2005 to 1.21 million abortions in 2008.
The group says the uptick points to the "need to enact and enforce laws that prohibit the more intrusive forms of harassment" against abortion providers. But a pro-life group said the numbers mask a human tragedy.
In a new report, "Abortion Incidence and Access to Services in the United States, 2008," the Guttmacher Institute found that there were 19.4 abortions for every 1,000 women in 2005 and 19.6 abortions for every 1,000 women in 2008.
That increase, however, is still below the peak of 29.3 abortions for every 1,000 women in 1981, when there were 1.57 million abortions performed in America. Since 1973, the number of total abortions in America is estimated at 49,551,703, according to the National Right to Life Committee.
The Guttmacher Institute also found that medication-based abortion had gone up 24 percent, from 161,000 to 199,000 between 2005 and 2008.
"That early medication abortion is becoming more widely available is good news," said Rachel Jones, lead author of the new study. "U.S. government reports have shown that abortions are increasingly occurring earlier in pregnancy, when the procedure is safest. Increased access to medication abortion is helping to accelerate that trend."
The study looked at women ages 15 through 44.
The increased number of abortions between 2005 and 2008 is all the more reason to reduce restrictions on abortion, according to Guttmacher Institute President Sharon Camp.
"In this time of heightened politicization around abortion, our stalled progress should be an urgent message to policymakers that we need to do more to increase access to contraceptive services to prevent unintended pregnancy, while ensuring access to abortion services for the many women who still need them," Camp said in a statement.
A pro-life group complained that in reporting the Guttmacher Institute's findings, reporters focused on numbers rather than conveying the loss: "Instead of reflecting on the 1,212,350 unique members of society that America will never know, the headlines all minimized the tragedy that is 'choice,' the Family Research Council said.
"But in terms of casualties -- real human victims -- this "slight rise" means that our country dug 6,150 new graves in 2008. That's more than the entire student population at Yale, Princeton, Brown, or Dartmouth."
To put it in perspective, the Family Research Council used the example of Saturday's mass shooting in Tucson, Arizona: "Who among us, after reading their stories, would say the gunman 'only' killed six victims? Yet somehow, in a society calloused by convenience, it's acceptable to describe the loss of millions of unborn children as 'just' this or that. However political this debate has become, it's important to remember the moral crisis that got us here. And until we address that fundamental problem, these statistics are bound to yo-yo into the new century."
The FRC said one way to reduce the number of abortions in the U.S. is to stop paying for them.
Two lawmakers are trying to do just that. In the first days of the new Congress, U.S. Reps. Chris Smith (R-N.J.) and Dan Lipinski (D-Ill.) introduced the "No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act," which would prohibit federal funding to Planned Parenthood, the nation's largest abortion provider.
The increased number of abortions shows more work needs to be done in Congress and in state legislatures to protect mothers and unborn children, said Jeanne Monahan, director of the Family Research Council's Center of Human Dignity.
"The nation's abortion rate has declined for many years because of the tireless work of and growth of pregnancy resource centers, pro-life educational campaigns, and the enactment of state laws such as parental notification and informed consent," Monahan said.
"Recent polls indicate that a majority of Americans now describe themselves as pro-life, and are overwhelmingly opposed to their hard-earned dollars going to pay for abortions," she added.
Monahan noted that Planned Parenthood disclosed in its 2008-2009 annual report that it had received $363.2 million in government grants and contracts, a $13.6 million increase from the prior year. Also, Monahan noted, Planned Parenthood's Web site shows that the group performed 324,008 abortions in 2008, up from 305,310 in 2007.
"Claims made by Guttmacher that a slight increase in abortion somehow warrants fewer restrictions on late-term abortions or an increase in restrictions on peaceful protests is absurd," said Monahan. "How can they say abortion rates aren't high enough?"
The Guttmacher study also reported that there were 1,793 abortion providers in the United States in 2008, up from 1,787 in 2005. Further, the report said that, in 2008, "the overwhelming majority of U.S. counties (87 percent) lacked an abortion provider, and 35 percent of women of reproductive age lived in these counties."
As for harassment, the report said that 88 percent of abortion clinics "experienced at least one form of harassment in 2008," including picketing, patient blocking and vandalism.
In conclusion, the Guttmacher Institute said, "it is important to remove barriers to abortion services, especially for low-income women. Only 17 states use their own funds to cover all or most medically necessary abortions for women with Medicaid coverage. If more states did so, or if federal restrictions on Medicaid coverage for abortions were lifted, poor women could more easily access services when confronted with an unintended pregnancy."
Also, "more states need to enact and enforce laws that prohibit the most overt and damaging forms of harassment and allow access to this legal, needed and basic health care service," the report stated.
Contact: Fred Lucas
Source: CNSNews.com
Publish Date:January 12, 2011
