2019 abortion statistics

QUIZQUEEN under ANY circumstances ,so you would force a child who had been abused to carry to full termand deliver ,or a owman who was raped or someone whose scan showed a condition incompatable with life at 12 weeks gestation .You think thats the way to go?
Thank whatever "god" you believe in that most of us aren't that inhumane .These scenarios are happening daily women would kill themselves trying to abort or just kill themselves if they hadn't a CHOICE to have a termination.

Totally agree with those on here who have said (A) it is not a baby - it is a foetus, (B) Womens right of choice (C) every baby should be a wanted one.

Can too easily remember the times before the abortion act, the horrors of backstreet abortions, women dying or having horrendous effects for the rest of their lives.

Those I know who have had abortions, do not do so lightly - do not think many see it as contraceptive.

Just thank goodness there is safe terminations of pregnancies these days.

No-one should pontificate about abortion until they have spent nine miserable months suffering from one or more of the possible complications of pregnancy while supporting financially, emotionally, physically and socially their existing large brood of children, among whom are at least one with physical, mental or emotional disabilities.

They should keep quiet unless they have survived a pregnancy caused by rape or abuse without themselves needing psychiatric treatment or giving birth to a child with birth defects caused by the mutiplication of genetic defects by incest.

They should thank their lucky stars and refrain from criticism if they have a partner who co-operates with contraception and doesn't demand his "rights" instantly without recourse to the contraception which for him will make those rights "like having a bath with your socks on". They could extend those thanks to being glad they don't have the bruises as evidence of the times they held out against intercourse without contraception.

They could take a look at their bank account, or their wages slip, and set it against their outgoings, to estimate whether they can afford another mouth to feed and another little body to clothe, keep warm, house, and protect for the next eighteen years.

(Incidentally, the meaning of the word pontificate is "to lecture as though they are as infallible as the Pope, the pontiff, and as though God is speaking directly through them"

The pontiff, of course, has no children AT ALL, and is indeed celibate, so he has no practical experience of any of the ramifications of the sexual and child-bearing life led by ordinary people - the female half of whom do all the dirty work of conceiving, incubating, bearing and raising all the population of the world. If during his ascent from the seminary through the ranks of the clergy to the "top job" he has succumbed to the natural inclination of men to enjoy union with a woman, and that has proved fruitful, then it is the woman who carries and bears that child, usually hidden away from public view, or disguised with a suitable cover story. Or who sought an illegal abortion to cover her shame.)

I tnink one of the things we are still unaware of is how many abortions were carried out before the Abortion act was passed. For rich women these were done in private clinics, for poor women by back street abortionists or self administered. I have recently come to the conclusion that my own mother did just this. I think it is possibly something that was much more widespread than we assume and could be done by any woman with a little medical knowledge. They would then be called miscarriages.

In David Olusoga’s programme, A House Through Time, last week he discovered that a resident had been involved in selling medication that was alleged to provoke a miscarriage, amongst other things. I spoke to my 92yo mum about the programme and she remembers from her Saturday job in a chemist that women would ask for Penny Royal pills.

It probably wasn’t very effective but the desire to control one’s fertility is an age-old one.

True, Trisher There is an assumption that before the Abortion Act abortion was a rare occurrence. In fact it happened far more often than anyone would be aware of, because it was necessarily cloaked in secrecy. How many women took medication (or mixtures of herbs) for"irregularity of their menstrual cycle"?

The knowledge of which herbs would do that - restore periods which had somehow or other become "irregular" or non-existent, was known to women from time immemorial. Pennyroyal was one of them, and tansy, thuja, safflower, scotch broom, rue, angelica, mugwort, wormwood, yarrow, and of course ergot.

In the Middle Ages, there was a monastery just off the A68 at Soutra on the Scottish/Engish border. Only a small building remains now, but it was a large community, whose speciality was medical and surgical care for the local population and for travellers. They were on the main road across which many waves of armies marched through the inhospitable moors, and were no doubt a welcome sight to footsore soldiers, on their way to invade, or returning with their injured and sick. There was a hospital, and gardens full of medicinal herbs.

Excavations a few years ago revealed in the drains various remains of medicinal mixtures. As well as a mixture of hemlock, henbane and opium poppy, which would have made a potent anaesthetic for amputations and so on, and dressings of opium and lard, there were mixtures which would get rid of worms, and other concoctions.

The most relevant mix for this discussion was one of ergot fungus and juniper berries. "Another intriguing find at Soutra Aisle is the discovery of the remains of stillborn babies, and the presence of ergot fungus and juniper berries. The ergot fungus is a parasitic fungus that attacks cereal crops, and is now known to contain alkaloids, including ergometrine, which causes contractions of the uterus. Juniper berries are also said to have been referred to as a ‘uterine stimulant’. Therefore, it has been speculated that the combination of these two elements might have been used to help with childbirth, or abortion. As Augustinian monks were strictly forbidden to practise midwifery, it raises the possibility that this was either practised illegally by the monks at the hospital, or that female midwives were also working at Soutra Aisle." With the armies that bivouacked there as they passed would have been large numbers of women, employed in various domestic work for the armies, and doubtless in relationships with the men. A pregnancy while travelling with an active army would have been most inconvenient and dangerous! The local women would have known where to get help when they needed it too.
www.ancient-origins.net/ancient-places-europe/incredible-medical-interventions-monks-soutra-aisle-003285

There is nothing new under the sun.

Elegran I like your insightful posts on this issue. The information you give is most interesting.

I agree. Thank you Elegran. Very interesting.

Babies who weren't aborted sometimes came to an even more grisly end:

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-berkshire-39330793

I don't suppose Emily Dyer was the only baby farmer, who disposed of some of the babies supposedly in her care.

That’s amazing, Elegran. I hadn’t heard of that place, thank you for telling us about it.

I remember reading that article a few years back Growstuff and was gobsmacked that ‘fostering’ had a different meaning way back!

On fostering children - I have researched my family history, and found one of my female ancestors featuring in a contemporary newspaper in the mid 19th Century, local to where she lived. It seems a woman turned up on her doorstep asking her to take in her child, less than a year old, while she was obliged to go into the workhouse for a while (it didn't say why - I have a theory which I will add later.)

The child was taken in, (though my ancestor's husband claimed to have been completely unaware that he had been taken in!) and looked after for several weeks, after which his mother returned to collect him. She is reported to have discovered that he was thin, undernourished, had extensive and deep nappy rash, and was in fact seriously ill and lethargic. He had apparently "refused to eat" and "didn't thrive" although he had been plied, among other things, with wine! A doctor was called in, who had him immediately admitted to hospitsl, where after a few days he died. A furore ensued, which resulted in both my ancestor and her husband being convicted of neglect. Only the woman was sentenced to a spell in jail, the jury seeming to believe that he had been unaware that his wife was looking after another child as well as their own family. Clearly not a man who interacted much with his progeny.

I like to mind my own business on this one. Not my body, not my life, not my choice.

My theory of the story behind this sad episode is this. The mother stated that she was about to enter the workhouse. This was a choice so I suspect that she was pregnant again, and near her time. Had she taken him into the workhouse with her, he would have been put into the nursery and she may not have got him back again. So she left him where she knew that babies had been left before

If you had sex before the era of effective (mostly) contraception, you were likely at some point to become pregnant. ALL pregnant women ran a very real risk of dying while pregnant (the biggest cause of death to women throughout history has been pregnancy and its complications, or the dangers of labour and post-labour infections)

However, if you were already living in poverty your risk was even greater. Ante-natal care was non-existent for most women, you relied on the support of your mother and sisters, and the local "wise woman" who knew more than most doctors. Those with money called in a midwife for the actual confinement, those without any did without, unless they could be admitted to the infirmary attached to the nearest workhouse. That was the only medical care of any kind you would get, if you were poor.

To do that, you presented yourself at the door destitute and in labour, were taken in and your baby delivered. If her baby wasn't legitimate and she was unsupported by the father, she might take the first chance she could to leave the workhouse without it - and as its survival chances were pretty low, she might have left without it anyway.

Is it any wonder that abortion rates were higher in the 19th century than in the 21st?

Thanks Elegran that is fascinating
I knew what David O was going to say SueDonim as soon as he mentioned Penny Royal. I think I remember my mum telling me it didn't work!

Contraception can fail easily, none are 100%, as I well know.

Yes, me too, Trisher. The other substance my mother said women asked for was Slippery Elm. Apparently, pieces of the inner bark inserted into the cervix could trigger a miscarriage. People eventually assumed it would also work if you took it orally but there’s no evidence for that.

When I was investigating different methods (many years ago!) it was quite depressing to read their respective failure rates - even a 1% per woman/year failure rate means a LOT of unexpected pregnancies, and there were none which scored as low as that - I think the best was 3%. That means that of 100 women using it for a year, three would become pregnant, and that was the best of the bunch.

The other statistic I found at about the same time (this was before the 1967 Abortion Act) was that of the (official) abortion rates in various countries. If unofficial and illegal abortions were included the numbers would have been much higher. Most of them hovered around 3 in 1000 live births, or the same sort of figures, but some claimed unbelievably low rates, like 0.01% of live births, or some such thing. The eye-opener was Soviet Russia, where abortions were six times live births! So the average Russian woman would have had six abortions for every living child.

Thanks Elegran, great contributions.

Thank you for your comment growstuff.
Of course you are quite right that vast numbers do not believe in God and they have that free choice.
The enormity of aborted babies are enough to fill 'oceans.'
Life is precious.
I am just so happy that the time is drawing closer to when everyone will see a visible sign that God does, indeed exist without a shadow of a doubt.
Never more do we need this to happen in our world, then now - there is so much sin in our world that it cannot be allowed to continue.
Don't imagine that I think of myself as being perfect - non of us are!

Elegran - thank you. That was very interesting.

Elegran Women in the former Eastern bloc relied on abortion as a form of contraception. Very few women in former East Germany had more than one child. They were expected to put the children into state-run nurseries, which were free or very cheap, and go back to work. Medical contraception wasn't that easy to obtain.

I think you'll find that most people don't believe that either NannyC2.

Thank you, Growstuff ~The effect on those women in the Eastern Bloc must have been very traumatic. No-one undergoes an abortion without heartache, not even those who on the surface appear to be hard-boiled. Even if the conscious mind accepts it as a logical step, the hormones involved are not logical. They are the same hormones which come into play after the successful and longed-for delivery of a live child.

Indeed NannyC2 : when a human is conceived in that ridgling mass of cells there is a innate design ~ for the development of a you and a me. That little wriggle has a spirit such as we have, a spirit to love and a spirit to absorb love, a lovable 'sprite' ----reflecting its Creator's spirit of LIFE

I vehemently disagree with some pro-life contributors here: there must always be a choice.

I understand that the subject is difficult and unpalatable for some but a child needs love and an unwanted child born into a difficult relationship/no relationship to a reluctant mother is a recipe for unhappiness all round. That child will have to be supported for at least 18 years!

I do think that late-abortions (unless medically valid) are unpleasant and would prefer the cut-off point to be perhaps 20-21 weeks (time enough to realise one is pregnant etc.) but overall we need to be in charge of our bodies and lives.

Throughout history, child-rearing has fallen to women and probably always will, despite (so-called) equality. Motherhood is the most wonderful thing but love in huge quantities is required and is unlikely to be produced by an unhappy reluctant mother.