TYT: How Many Abortions Take Place In America?

[democracy1st]

Run time: 03:03 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2eRGHHzfVn4   Posted on YouTube: December 05, 2009 By YouTube Member: Views on YouTube: 0   Posted on DU: December 08, 2009 By DU Member: democracy1st Views on DU: 781

 
http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog

Abortion is rarely out of the news in the US. Right now, Catholic bishops and Protestant evangelists in the US have unleashed an intense lobbying campaign to force fresh limitations on access to abortion into healthcare legislation under debate in the Senate this week.

Pro-choice groups have described the religious ambush of health reform – which this month pressured the House of Representatives to effectively block women from using medical insurance to pay for abortions – as one of the most serious threats to abortion rights of recent years.

Meanwhile, the murder of prominent abortion doctor Dr George Tiller at his Kansas church in the summer added fresh impetus to the US abortion debate.

So, what are the numbers? Despite - or maybe because of - the political importance of the debate, they're not clear. Compiled by the US Centers for Disease Control they only go up to 2005, and there is some doubt over whether later ones will be published. The report itself only has the tables images, ie, they can't be copied unless you type them out.

Well, that is what we have done, just with a couple of tables - total figures and a breakdown by state. There are some omissions. California, the most populous state in the union, does not compile (or release) abortion figures.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2009/nov/30/abortion-us-states-obama-healthcare-data



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[baldguy]

1. They go up under Republican administrations, and down under Democrats

[napi21]

2. Question: How is that even possible? I keep hearing about how difficult

it is to get an abortion and so many women have to travel long distances if they want to get an abortion. I question just what those states who report count as an abortion? I know in some medical circles a miscarriage is called a spontaneous abortion. how many of these are even legal under the Hyde amendment (rape, incest or life of the woman)?

It has always been my belief that if something you hear doesn't make sense, something is wrong with the data, and I've almost never been proven wrong.

[progressoid]

5. According to the CDC ( where the Guardian got it's info)

...Legal induced abortion was defined as a procedure, performed by a licensed physician or someone acting under the supervision of a licensed physician, that was intended to terminate a suspected or known intrauterine pregnancy and to produce a nonviable fetus at any gestational age (1,2). The total number of legal induced abortions was available from all reporting areas; however, not all of these areas collected data on some or all characteristics of women who obtained abortions

[Dogmudgeon]

3. One for every $135,000 in tax relief the churches get

I think that's in the right "ballpark".

--d!

[izquierdista]

4. How much can that be reduced by better birth control?

Going on the principle that it is better to prevent a pregnancy than terminate one, there have got to be ways to reduce this number. Abortion really should be minimized to the point where it is only needed when a planned pregnancy has run into major problems.