Posted on 02/23/2006 4:56:47 AM PST by Milltownmalbay
New studies show that women suffer serious side-effects after aborting a child, says Zenit.org. Many of these side-effects are psychological, and effect woman long after the abortion has taken place.
The Sydney Morning Herald reported the “most detailed long-term study to date into the divisive question.” The New Zealand study was done by David Fergusson, who describes himself as “an atheist, a rationalist and pro-choice”. The study tracked 1,265 girls born in the 1970s. 41% of these woman became pregnant by the age of 25, and 14.6% (90 women) sought an abortion. By the age of 25, 42% of those who procured an abortion also experienced a major depression. This number was 35% higher than those who had chosen to continue a pregnancy. The risk of anxiety disorders rose in a similar fashion. A woman who had procured an abortion was twice as likely to drink alcohol at dangerous levels compared to one who continued the pregnancy.
The Washington Times reported a study done by Priscilla Coleman that claimed that woman who aborted has a 144% greater risk of physically abusing their children compared to those who did not terminate their pregnancy. Coleman said that a “good number of women who have abortions” experience bereavement and guilt, which turn to anger.
Coleman also noticed that though women who have miscarriages also experience negative psychological effects, these effects last longer in women who have aborted. A study carried out at the University of Oslo supports this statement. The study looked at 40 women who suffered miscarriages and 80 women who terminated a pregnancy. Researchers questioned the woman at 10 days, six months, two years, and five years after the end of the pregnancy. Woman who had miscarriages suffered more negative effects at the 6 month period. However, those who had an abortion experience more mental distress at the two and five year period.
Abortion also effects having another baby. A French study of 2,837 births found woman who once had an abortion were 1.7 times more likely to give birth to a baby at less than 28 weeks gestation. Babies born at this point die soon after birth, or suffer serious disability if they survive.
The South Dakota Department of Health has accumulated statistics from the year 2003 regarding abortions in the state. In 814 out of the 819 procedures, the only information given to the pregnant mothers about the unborn children was the gestational age of the children. In 813 of the procedures, this information was provided by a recorded statement. Mothers never had a chance to question the doctor. According to witnesses from a Planned Parenthood clinic, the first time the women met their physician was in the procedure room. At that point, the woman has signed a consent form and committed to the procedure.
Selena Ewing, a researcher at the Southern Cross Bioethics Institute, Adelaide, has found that most abortions result from lack of support of pregnant women, from both men and the community. Abortions are also linked with domestic violence.
Abortion is not a medical procedure, it is political. If it were medical health care providers would be responsible for informed consent that would include information on the severe clinical depression that occurs 40% of the time. A 24 hour waiting period would happen that would weed out 50% of the patients that weren't sure of their decision.
Abortions could be made rare and safe, by just making them follow best practice and medically responsible to malpractice standards.
It won't happen easily.
DK
Imagine standing before St. Peter and telling him it was a "choice".
Guess what? Your comments are neither clever, nor insightful and they cannot justify your immoral agenda.
I didn't realize I was here to entertain you. Naturally, you are welcome to skip my posts.
Abortion apalls me, but I consider this part of the study to be backwards. I would argue that, generally, the abortion doesn't cause a woman to become more abusive, but rather that a more abusive woman is more likely to have an abortion as she already has a lower respect for the pain caused others.
And you are invited to take your advocacy of the murder of helpless innocent to someplace you are actually welcome.
It did rather shut the thread down, didn't it? :)
shiver.... surgical procedure...
Don't shudder. I was speaking of them generally, meaning any and all.
A heart transplant is a surgical procedure. An abortion is a murder. I don't consider it surgical when someone stabs someone or shoots someone. To call abortion a surgical procedure lends credence and even respectability to it. It also violates the doctor's oath of "First do no harm".
This is why abortion is an issue that is intimately entwined with religious belief. As much as abortion ideologues may wish to deny it, intelligent people can sincerely disagree on the moral status of a human embryo or fetus.
Even most pro-lifers refuse to support the prosecution of abortive women for murder, should abortion ever be banned. The reason for this is obviously that, even though they may personally feel that an embryo is the moral equivalent of a born human, they can understand how someone else could honestly disagree -- and they're not willing to send them to prison or the death chamber for that disagreement.
I'm interested in that last point of yours - if it is indeed, murder, why don't people want to punish it that way? It seems inconsistent.
That is certainly an issue that the pro-life movement will need to eventually deal with, especially if, as I anticipate will soon be the case, Roe Vs Wade is ultimately overruled. When banning abortion is no longer a theoretical question, pro-lifers will need to logically explain why child murderers should be automatically excused from punishment under the law.
Exactly; people call it murder all the time, why not then treat it as such? I've seen people call for the death penalty or imprisonment for the doctor - but not for the woman. In cases where someone has hired a hitman, the person who hires pays the same penalty as the hitman. Is this what people want?
In my time following the abortion debate, I've never found a logical and acceptable answer as to why the woman should get off scott free. The usual answer is that the woman is somehow also a victim and should be treated as such, but of course, we don't apply this logic to a thief who steals because he's poor, or a murderer who killed because he was raised by an abusive father. Every criminal can be said to be a victim in some sense.
"The usual answer is that the woman is somehow also a victim and should be treated as such"
Rather an insulting conclusion, when you think about it; the woman was too infantile/stupid/passive/whatever to know what she was doing. Poor dear.
The fact is that most everyone knows someone who has had an abortion (whether they're aware of who it is or not), and they have a tough time picturing someone as normal as their sister, cousin, secretary, or dental hygienist locked away in the slammer.
Major grammatical error in the first sentence.
As I've alluded to in other threads, there is an unmistakable sexism evident in much of the pro-life political movement. Simply believing that abortion is the killing of a person is not sexist, but some of the policies that pro-lifers support to remedy abortion clearly are.
The fact is that most everyone knows someone who has had an abortion (whether they're aware of who it is or not), and they have a tough time picturing someone as normal as their sister, cousin, secretary, or dental hygienist locked away in the slammer.
Apart from the logistical nightmare of imprisoning or executing a large percentage of the female population. They might not like the tax bill that would present itself should a prison system of the necessary size to house all these women actually be built.
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