dubois@uwmacc.UUCP (Paul DuBois) (09/05/84)
A short while back I posted the statement that liberalization
or legalization of abortion does not decrease the incidence
of illegal and back-alley abortion. I have received mail
requesting references for that statement, and thought I may
as well post it here, too.
-----
"although one of the major goals of the liberalization of
abortion laws in Scaninavia was to reduce the incidence
of illegal abortion, this was not accomplished. Rather,
as we know from a variety of sources, both criminal and
legal abortions increased."
Christopher Tietze, M.D., "Abortion in Europe," Annual Meeting of
the American Public Health Association, San Francisco, October 1966.
"in Hungary, though there are more legal abortions than live births,
illegal abortions have not decreased. ...In East Germany, illegal
abortions as well as births and pregnancies increased between 1948
and 1950, a period in which the abortion laws were liberalized
to allow abortions on social as well as on medical grounds...From
1946-1956, illegal abortions rose more than legal abortions."
H. Frederiksen and James Brackett, "Demographic Effects of Abortion,"
U. S. Public Health Reports, December 1966.
In England: the 1966 liberalized abortion law "produced increasing
deaths of patients and a growing number of abortion mills. Back-
street abortionists, instead of decreasing, have increased."
Jill Knight, member of Parliament, Birmingham Evening Mail and Dispatch,
Birmingham, England, October 15, 1966.
Director of Colorado state health department:
"the liberalized abortion law of 1968 has not done what we hoped it
would do - it has not cut down the percentage of illegal abortions."
E. N. Akers, Director Colorado Health Department, Denver Associated
Press Report, January 13, 1970.
New York's chief medical examiner:
"We're still getting abortions like those we had prior to liberalization
of the law."
Milton Halpern, Chief Medical Examiner, New York, Daily News, February
20, 1971.
--
Paul DuBois {allegra,ihnp4,seismo}!uwvax!uwmacc!dubois
Thy testimonies have I taken as an heritage forever: for they
are the rejoicing of my heart.
Psalm 119:111saquigley@watmath.UUCP (Sophie Quigley) (09/14/84)
Do the figures cited to support the increase of abortions after legalisation
of abortion take into account the increase of the population of child-bearing
age? Don't forget that there was a baby-boom in the 50s, and that those people
are right in their most productive years now wrt child-bearing.
Also, how reliable are "old" figures on abortion? do not forget that before
legalisation, there was a much bigger social stigma against abortion than
exists now, so having an abortion is not something that women would easily
admit having.
Sophie Quigley
...!{clyde,ihnp4,decvax}!watmath!saquigleywmartin@brl-tgr.ARPA (Will Martin ) (09/18/84)
The quotes certainly seem to justify the subject statement. However, does
anyone have any idea WHY the illegal abortions continue or even rise when
legal abortions are available? I can think of several possible reasons,
listed below. Are these true, and encompass the whole range of reasons,
or are there other causes?
1. Inertia -- "I've always gotten my abortions from Fred, and I'm not
going to change now." (This seems unlikely to me, but maybe...)
2. Bureaucratic red tape and hassle surrounding legal abortions; though
they may be "available" technically, you can really only get one
through persistence and fighting the system -- "Certainly
you can have an abortion; the approval cycle takes one year
from date of application..."
3. Cost -- Legal abortion is not covered by health insurance (this is
so for federal employee health plans, by the way), and the well-known
insane cost of hospital facilities, doctor fees, etc., makes
a legal abortion too expensive to pay for out of your own pocket.
The illegal has less overhead and charges a flat fee which is less.
(This also seems unlikely; I though illegal activities always
cost more than legal sources, and I also thought that most private
health insurance covered abortions. Whether public-funded legal
abortion is available to charity or welfare patients depends on
current political climate and where you live, right?)
4. Secrecy -- Getting a legal abortion puts you on many public records,
but an illegal one is of course off-the-record. (But just how
public are those records -- we did have a Privacy Act, plus all the
usual medical-confidentiality traditions, after all? And from
whom are you keeping it secret? An illegal makes you subject to
blackmail, for that matter.)
5. Convenience -- To get a legal abortion, you have to go to {the county
seat, the provincial hospital, Europe, America, the next town,
whatever}, but you can get an illegal one at home, or at the
laundromat, or somewhere close by. (This might be more applicable
in the foreign examples given in the base posting.)
6. Contrariness -- If something is available both legally and illegally,
some people will chose the illegal one just because it is. (?)
I don't know; none of these seem to be good enough reasons, either alone
or in combination, to account for a rise in illegal abortions when legal
ones are available. They might justify illegal abortions *not disappearing*
when legal ones are instituted, but no more. So what else is there?
Will Martin
(Please post, don't mail, discussions on this topic. Thanks!)