ABORTION



Abortion is the destruction of the fetus or unborn child while the child is still in the mother's womb.

Abortion - Reasons Women Choose Abortion
The decision to continue your pregnancy or to end it is very personal. Each year, nearly 1.2 million American women have an abortion to end a pregnancy.[|2] The most common reasons women consider [|abortion] are: In the United States, 9 out of 10 abortions are performed in the first 12 weeks ([|first trimester]) of pregnancy. Most of these are done within the first 9 weeks of pregnancy.[|2] Very few abortions are done after 16 weeks of pregnancy. But some women have to delay abortions because they have trouble with paying for, finding, or traveling to an abortion specialist.
 * [|Birth control] (contraceptive) failure. Over half of all women who have an abortion used a contraceptive method during the month they became pregnant.[|2]
 * Inability to support or care for a child.
 * To end an unwanted [|pregnancy].
 * To prevent the birth of a child with [|birth defects] or severe medical problems. Such defects are often unknown until routine second-trimester tests are done.
 * Pregnancy resulting from rape or incest.
 * Physical or mental conditions that endanger the woman's health if the pregnancy is continued.

**There are two types of abortion**
- **In-clinic abortion** -There are two types of in clinic abortion, aspiration and a D&E- dilation and evacutation. An aspiration is used if it is performed in the forst 16 weeks. After 16 weeks they perform and d&e. -**Abortion pill** -Generally used before 9 weeks.The name of this pill is mifepristone and it is 97% effective. //WebMD Medical Reference from Healthwise// //Planned Parenthood//

**Induced Abortion and Breast Cancer** Chapter 2 contains 25 endnotes including:
 * Abortion increases a woman's overall risk of breast cancer by 30 per cent.
 * The risk is likely much higher in women who have a first abortion at a young age, or who have a family history of breast cancer.
 * Since 1957, 23 of 37 worldwide studies show an increased breast cancer risk with abortion, a risk as high as 310 per cent.
 * Ten of fifteen U.S. studies confirm the abortion-breast cancer link.
 * The biological rationale for breast cancer development is related to the woman's unprotected internal exposure to estrogen when a pregnancy is abruptly terminated early in gestation.
 * The magnitude of the risk has, until recently, been hidden by studies of poor quality, many of which have failed to separate induced abortion from low-risk spontaneous miscarriage.
 * The medical establishment is often slow to accept and respond to emerging data, slowed further, in this case, by the conflicting politics of abortion.

Daling JR, Malone KE, Voigt LF, White E, Weiss NS. Risk of breast cancer among young women: relationship to induced abortion. Journal of the National Cancer Institute 1994 Nov(2);86(21):1584-92. 

Chapter 11 contains 53 endnotes including:
 * Psychological Risk Factors**
 * Women who have abortions are at risk of emotional difficulties after the procedure, especially those with pre-existing factors such as relationship problems, ambivalence about their abortion, adolescence, previous psychiatric or emotional problems, pressure by others into making a decision to abort, or religious or philosophical values that are at odds with aborting a pregnancy.
 * The prevailing interpretation of post-abortion grief, depression, guilt, anger, and anxiety in abortion clinics and research studies in North America is that they are due, not to the procedure, but to a woman's pre-existing disposition to psychological problems.
 * Where support through counseling is offered (for example, in Sweden) to pregnant women who are not sure if they should or can carry their pregnancy to term, they are more likely not to abort.
 * Given the evidence that women in certain risk groups are more emotionally vulnerable after an abortion, should abortion clinics and medical facilities consider recommending against abortion in their cases? This question has become crucial given recent findings that women who abort are much likelier to commit suicide.
 * Informed consent for the psychological well-being of women, post-abortion, is an issue which health care professionals should address.

The Emotional Effects of Induced Abortion. Fact Sheet. New York: Planned Parenthood Federation of America, May 2000.