New report: Abortions in US drop to lowest level since 1974

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So even the states that haven’t further restricted it have seen decreases. So, this means people are getting better at not getting pregnant?
 
HerCrazierHalf said:
So even the states that haven’t further restricted it have seen decreases. So, this means people are getting better at not getting pregnant?
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Yes. The decline in abortion is mainly due to the decline in unwanted pregnancies, which is due to the increased access to birth control.
 
AFerri48 said:
I’m not sure if this is including abortion pills.
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Anything after implantation is considered abortion. If it’s the one they give at Planned Parenthood it absolutely is an abortion. Some have even recovered the dead fetus after taking it. The morning after pill I’m not sure about.
 
J_Peterson said:
Anything after implantation is considered abortion. If it’s the one they give at Planned Parenthood it absolutely is an abortion. Some have even recovered the dead fetus after taking it. The morning after pill I’m not sure about.
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For honesty reasons I hope they include abortion pills.

As for the morning after pill, my understanding is that its main action is attempting to prevent implantation. That if implantation has already occurred it won’t terminate the pregnancy.
 
TMC said:
Yes. The decline in abortion is mainly due to the decline in unwanted pregnancies, which is due to the increased access to birth control.
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Faulty reasoning. The conclusion is not necessarily implied by the premise.

Increased access to birth control generally results in increased sexual activity, which increases the likelihood of the birth control having a failure (or, not technically the likelihood, but the number of opportunities for that failure to occur.) Given that the individuals for whom this failure occurs were already seeking to avoid pregnancy, the likelihood of them procuring an abortion is probably higher.

In reality, this decrease is probably due to them only having to report instances of surgical abortion, which are slowly being phased out in favor of chemical abortions. Since those chemicals abortions are becoming more commonplace, and since they don’t have to be reported, this results in skewed reporting on the numbers.

With that said, I do hope there’s been a genuine decrease.
 
ProdglArchitect said:
Faulty reasoning. The conclusion is not necessarily implied by the premise.

Increased access to birth control generally results in increased sexual activity, which increases the likelihood of the birth control having a failure (or, not technically the likelihood, but the number of opportunities for that failure to occur.) Given that the individuals for whom this failure occurs were already seeking to avoid pregnancy, the likelihood of them procuring an abortion is probably higher.

In reality, this decrease is probably due to them only having to report instances of surgical abortion, which are slowly being phased out in favor of chemical abortions. Since those chemicals abortions are becoming more commonplace, and since they don’t have to be reported, this results in skewed reporting on the numbers.

With that said, I do hope there’s been a genuine decrease.
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There has been a genuine decrease, and it is the result of increased birth control.
 
ProdglArchitect said:
Faulty reasoning. The conclusion is not necessarily implied by the premise.

Increased access to birth control generally results in increased sexual activity, which increases the likelihood of the birth control having a failure (or, not technically the likelihood, but the number of opportunities for that failure to occur.) Given that the individuals for whom this failure occurs were already seeking to avoid pregnancy, the likelihood of them procuring an abortion is probably higher.

In reality, this decrease is probably due to them only having to report instances of surgical abortion, which are slowly being phased out in favor of chemical abortions. Since those chemicals abortions are becoming more commonplace, and since they don’t have to be reported, this results in skewed reporting on the numbers.

With that said, I do hope there’s been a genuine decrease.
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They account for “medication abortions” in their stats, apparently 45% of procedures.

Also, it seems to be a genuine decrease since states that didn’t enact further restrictions also saw decreases. I think the contraception = more activity logic ignores a large portion of people who will be active regardless.

I can understand not wanting to promote abc beyond just religious reasons. But it is gradually appearing to be one of the drivers of lower abortion rates. Well that and younger Mir fertile age groups are simply interacting in person less and engaging in less activity vs earlier generations.
 
I’m not sure if the Guttmacher Institute looks at data for abortion for all US states.

I reccomed looking at this article by Michael J New regarding analyses of data from the Guttmacher Institute from 2014 when they also claimed a decline in the abortion rate. He points out that a change in how the public views abortion should be considered. New notes a study that found the biggest decline in the abortion rate was among teens and women in “early 20s.” He notes that Long Acting Reversible Contraceptives “tend to be unpopular” with women this age and that there is data showing a decrease in teenagers having sex. He also points out that there has been a trend of increasing contraception use since the 1960s but the decline in the abortion rate has not been seen for all that time.

If an increase in contraception usage is the be all and end all to reducing abortion rates, then why in several countries that saw an increase in the use of contraception did they also see an increase in the abortion rate? As shown below:
An honest look at the data shows that in virtually every country that increased the use of contraception, there was a simultaneous increase in that country’s abortion rate. In England (Rise in contraceptive use: simultaneous rise in abortions), France (Rise in contraceptive use: simultaneous rise in abortions), Australia, (Rise in contraceptive use: simultaneous rise in abortions), Portugal (Whose abortion rate only began to rise after 1999, after oral contraceptive methods were made widely available), Canada (Whose abortion rate only began to rise after the legalization of oral contraceptives in 1969), and, as the Guttmacher Institute shows, Singapore, Cuba, Denmark, the Netherlands, and South Korea, to name a few.
And of course, we saw this rise in the land of the free and home of the brave. Contraceptive devices gained popularity throughout the 1900’s, and were “legalized” in 1965. The widespread proliferation of contraceptive devices followed. The abortion rate began to creep up at this same time, after 1965, from 0.02 abortions per 1,000 women ages 15-44 in 1965 to 16.33 in 1973, when abortion was legalized.
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patheos.com/blogs/badcatholic/2012/11/does-contraception-reduce-the-abortion-rate.html

So perhaps there is something else going on here than an increase in contraception being the answer for a decline in the abortion rate.
 
Thank God for the decrease in abortions. If easy access to contraception is part of the solution that is working in this country then so be it!🙂
 
If access to birth control has lowered the number of abortions to their lowest level since 1974, which takes us back a long time to just a yr after abortion was found by the SCOTUS to be a woman’s Constitutional right in the first trimester under the Court’s Roe v Wade ruling, I’m wondering if it is wise to defund Planned Parenthood. But while I don’t practice the faith, I realize of course the Catholic Church also opposes ABC and not only abortion.
 
Sy_Noe said:
If access to birth control has lowered the number of abortions to their lowest level since 1974, which takes us back a long time to just a yr after abortion was found by the SCOTUS to be a woman’s Constitutional right in the first trimester under the Court’s Roe v Wade ruling, I’m wondering if it is wise to defund Planned Parenthood. But while I don’t practice the faith, I realize of course the Catholic Church also opposes ABC and not only abortion.
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I wish I could quote the exact text, but I read the transcript, and a lawyer arguing for Planned Parenthood drew the logical connection between abortion and contraception as well. I believe it was PP vs. Casey. Years earlier, St. John Paul II said that they were two fruits from the same tree.
 
TCEL said:
Never mind that it’s a sin.
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One of the greatest gifts we were given by God is free will. Having a well formed conscience along with free will is quite special. When I am discussing “a well formed conscience” I do not mean memorizing the CCC, I mean using your intellect and heart to reseach and make some decisions concerning the so-called moral issues in the modern world.:rolleyes:
 
kozlosap said:
One of the greatest gifts we were given by God is free will. Having a well formed conscience along with free will is quite special. When I am discussing “a well formed conscience” I do not mean memorizing the CCC, I mean using your intellect and heart to reseach and make some decisions concerning the so-called moral issues in the modern world.:rolleyes:
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But while you would get no argument from me, is that what the CC means by a “well formed conscience”?

In a related question, does anyone have figures on how many Catholics use ABC but consider themselves practicing, attending Mass, etc? I’ve seen in the past high numbers but not sure of the accuracy of those numbers today.
 
kozlosap said:
One of the greatest gifts we were given by God is free will. Having a well formed conscience along with free will is quite special. When I am discussing “a well formed conscience” I do not mean memorizing the CCC, I mean using your intellect and heart to reseach and make some decisions concerning the so-called moral issues in the modern world.:rolleyes:
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There are at least two thousand years of intellect and heart in the catechism.
 
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