Abortion Advocates Try to Disprove Study on Abortion-Mental Health Problems

Life News ^ | 12/13/10 | Steven Ertelt

[wagglebee]

Two pro-abortion research have set up to try to disprove a study  showing women who have abortions are more likely to have suffer from a variety of mental health problems than women who carry to term.

Published by Professor Priscilla Coleman of Bowling Green State University in the Journal of Psychiatric Research, the study showing women having abortions were at greater risk for anxiety as well as mood and substance abuse disorders.

Julia Steinberg of the University of California, San Francisco, and Lawrence Finer of the Guttmacher Institute, a pro-abortion group that is a former affiliate of the Planned Parenthood abortion business have set out to disprove Coleman’s findings.

They published their analysis in the journal Social Science & Medicine saying they failed to find the same links even taking similar factors into account.

“We were unable to reproduce the most basic tabulations of Coleman and colleagues,” Steinberg said. “Moreover, their findings were logically inconsistent with other published research — for example, they found higher rates of depression in the last month than other studies found during respondents’ entire lifetimes. This suggests that the results were substantially inflated.”

“Antiabortion activists have relied on questionable science in their efforts to push inclusion of the concept of ‘post-abortion syndrome’ in both clinical practice and law,” Finer added, according to a Washington Post report. “Our inability to replicate the findings of the Coleman study makes it clear that research claiming to find relationships between abortion and poor mental health indicators should be subjected to close scrutiny.”

LifeNews.com spoke with Coleman, who said the pro-abortion researchers used a different set of criteria to evaluate the abortion-mental health problem link.

“Despite their many claims to have conducted a ‘re-analysis’ of our study published in the Journal of Psychiatric Research and Finer have conducted a very different set of analyses,” Coleman said.

“The critical distinction is in how the psychological disorders were defined,” she explained. “Our analyses reflected 12-month prevalence and their analyses reflected only the 30 day prevalence. Our results are quite similar to those reported by pro-choice researcher David Fergusson in 2006 and many others. There are additional differences between the two sets of analyses, most notably related to the choice of potential confounding variables and the methods used to control them in the analyses.”

Coleman notes the 30 published studies from the last five years coming from researchers and scientists worldwide.

“Are all these studies flawed too? The real story here is the lengths that biased researchers, professional organizations, and the media will go to hide and distort highly credible scientific data,” she said.

Coleman wants to know if Steinberg and Finer plan to “replicate” the 2010 study by Mota and colleagues published in the Canadian Journal of Psychiatry where the authors used the NCS Replication data and their results were quite consistent with Coleman’s.

“I find it hard to imagine that Steinberg and Finer believe a journal as reputable as the JPR — edited by Alan Schatzberg, M.D., president-elect of the American Psychiatric Association — would publish an article indicating that abortion poses psychological risks to women independent of other stressors without scrutinizing the methodology carefully,” she added.

For Dr. Coleman, the criticizing of the research she and others have done on the top of abortion and its mental health consequences is a political one where abortion advocates critique the studies because they don’t like the results.

“These two authors have strong pro-choice ties. The first author is a recent recipient of the generous Charlotte Ellertson Social Science Fellowship and the second author is a long-time employee of the Guttmacher Institute. The conscientious reader will question their objectivity,” she concludes.

“These authors wrongly assumed we conducted our analyses in a particular manner and then made unprofessional, disparaging remarks, hoping I suppose to continue to hide the reality from women,” she says.

“We owe the millions of women who have had abortions in the past and will undergo them in the future a fair representation of the scientific research. After the highly biased American Psychological Association report was published two years ago, I conducted a meta-analysis or quantitative synthesis of the strongest studies. The results based on nearly a million respondents unequivocally indicate that abortion increases the risk of depression, anxiety, substance abuse, and suicide,” she adds.

[wagglebee]

The abortionists would have women believe that changing their hairstyle is a bigger decision than killing a baby.

[wagglebee]

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[wagglebee]

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[Herbster]

Of course they are.

They will fail to produce anything without selective statistics.

Anyone that has done this act, eventually comes to grip exactly what they have done.

[TigersEye]

Which study? There a lot of them.

Abortion is not about saving women’s lives!

49,551,703

Total Abortions since 1973

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Why the drop after 1960? (in deaths of women from illegal abortions)

The reasons were new and better antibiotics, better surgery and the establishment of intensive care units in hospitals. This was in the face of a rising population. Between 1967 and 1970 sixteen states legalized abortion. In most it was limited, only for rape, incest and severe fetal handicap (life of mother was legal in all states). There were two big exceptions — California in 1967, and New York in 1970 allowed abortion on demand. Now look at the chart carefully.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Abortion Statistics - Decision 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

----------------------------------------------------------------------

So how many women’s lives have been saved by abortion?

Less than 3% of abortions since 1972 were reported to be “due to a risk to maternal health.” A reasonable person would recognize that not all of those cases represent a lethal risk. But let’s say they did. That means that nearly 45 million fetuses were butchered to save the lives of about 1.3 million women. Or put another way; 35 babies are killed to save each woman.

Abortion was legal in all 50 states prior to Roe v. Wade in cases of danger to the life of the woman.

Roe v Wade: FULL Text (The Decision that wiped out an entire Generation 33 years ago today)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chosen Child

Studies Find Abortions Have Long-Term Effects

An Unexpected Correlation: The Legacy of Abortion

Study: Previous Abortions Linked With Pre-Term Birth and Cerebral Palsy

American Psychological Association Ignores Abortion-Depression Link

Study finds depression suffered by 80% of women who abort

Post-Abortion Counselor Confirms Abortions Cause Women Mental Health Issues

Abortion and Premature Birth Link Confirmed in New Study

Spanish Medical Expert: Damage to Women Caused by Abortion is Scientifically Proven

Science Catches Up with Religion Researchers prove fetuses have memories, know mothers’ voices..

Women Need More Mental Health Treatment After Abortion, New Study Finds

Teens Cope With Unwanted Pregnancies Better Than Abortions, Study Shows

New Study: Top Reason for Women's Abortions is No Supportive Partner, Father

New Study: Direct Link Between Abortion and Mental Health Problems

Researcher: Johns Hopkins Paper Biased on Abortion-Mental Health Issues

Abortion Linked to Higher Rates of Child Abuse, Study Finds

Women Want to Know of Abortion Risks Beforehand, New Survey Shows

Recent Poll Reveals Most Americans Think Abortion Hurts Women

Planned Parenthood Misleads Women on Abortion's Mental Health Risks

Study: Abortions Cause Future Relationship Problems, More Domestic Violence

[Gondring]

Is there a place I can get copies of these papers?

Do you know how the analysis handled pre-existing conditions (e.g., were those who were suicidal more likely to have an abortion?)?

[wagglebee]

Check the links that TigersEye posted above your post.

There is also a bunch of good information here:
http://rachelsvineyard.org/

[TigersEye]

I am sure those links are far from exhaustive. Those are just ones I happened across on FR threads and I made no concerted effort to find them. I can only imagine how many studies there are out there. I hate to imagine it really. What terrible suffering abortions cause that just goes on and on long after the baby is killed.

[Gondring]

Thanks!

[wagglebee]

There’s a bunch more information here:
http://www.silentnomoreawareness.org/
http://www.priestsforlife.org/

[crymeariver]

In every single case of friends I know that have had abortions, every single one of them suffer from at least one of the mentioned psychologic disorders.

[liberty or death]

“Abortion-Mental Health Problems”

There is not a family in this country that doesn't have a personal experience (mostly indirect) that disproves all the lies of the Abortion Industry. We have a niece who we did everything possible, including our adoption and care of the child to change her mind. She is now a wonderful mother of three who suffers endlessly about her 1st child she aborted 15 years ago.

[TigersEye]

Thank you.

[momtothree]

“... every single one of them suffer from at lest one of the mentioned psychological disorders”..

I know a close friend who had an abortion when she was 20. 25 years later, she still becomes depressed on what would have been her due date. Although she has gone to confession years and years ago, she hates the fact that she had one.

[Colonel Kangaroo]

As Galatians 6:7 states:

"Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap"

But pseudoscience and hyper political correctness are working overtime to deceive.