Replies

Well, the fact that it would prevent many more deaths than full legality would, kinda makes it a tad morally superior.

The evidence worldwide is that banning abortion does little to lower incidence. I refer to South America for the most compelling example. Argentina, Chile, Brazil, Peru -- all ban elective abortion and all have extremely high abortion rates. This is the rule rather than the exception. The Netherlands permits abortion with some controls and has one of the lowest abortion rates in the world. They've also had aggressive contraception programs in place for some time.

Now, many pro-life laws do have very significant impacts on incidence of abortion, informed consent being one of these. However there can be no informed consent laws if abortion is illegal.

Correlation doesn't establish causation. There are a number of factors that would affect the abortion rate one way or the other. IOW, comparison needs to be made in the same state/country before and after the laws were put into place, rather than comparing one country where it's legal with another where it's not. I, and I think most people, would require some pretty solid evidence that laws against abortion do not reduce the incidence of it. We know that in the U.S., Roe vs. Wade has resulted in (or at least contributed to) a substantial increase in it.