The Terrible Truth About "Choice"

According to Breitbart.com today, Spain says that abortions have risen 72% in the past ten years. Folks, these numbers are actually mind-boggling to me. The story reveals:

The number of abortions carried out in Spain has risen by almost three quarters in the past decade but the figure remains low by European standards, the country's health ministry said. In 2004 the total reached 84,985, up by 6.5 percent on 2003 (79,788) et 72 percent on 1995 (49,367), it reported.

For women aged between 15 and 44 the rate per thousand was 8.94 in 2004 compared with 8.77 in 2003.

But Health Minister Elena Salgado, taking the 2002 figure, said that Spain's figure was lower than that of Germany (15.35 percent), Finland (16.41 percent), France (18.34 percent), Denmark (18.9 percent), Italy (20.46 percent), Britain (22.82 percent) and Sweden (25.63 percent).

The great majority (86.7 percent) of abortions were carried out in private clinics, while 9.7 percent were carried out in private hospitals and 3.6 percent in public hospitals. The intervention in the first weeks of pregnancy costs between 300 and 400 euros in a private clinic.

Abortion was decriminalised in Spain in 1985 for certain cases: after rape, in the case of malformation of the foetus and if the pregnancy represents a threat to the physical or mental health of the woman.

The report said 95.7 percent of abortions were carried out for the last reason.

Huh?

I was stunned by these numbers until I did some reasearch myself. On the About.com website, I found more mind-numbing statistics about abortions in the United States! These stats are compared to world numbers. I've posted before about one American abortionist (warning - this post contains very graphic images), but these statistics are just... well... dang... You decide:

Abortion Statistics - World

• In 54 countries (61% of the world population) abortions are legal.
• In 97 countries (39% of the world population) abortions are illegal.
• There are approximately 46 million abortions conducted eacy year, 20 million of them obtained illegally.
• There are approximately 126,000 abortions conducted each day. (are you believing this?)

Abortion Statistics - U.S.

• Approximately 1,370,000 abortions occur annually in the U.S. according to the Alan Guttmacher Institute. Click here to see the approximate number of abortions in the U.S. per year from 1973-1996. In 2001, 1.31 million abortions took place.
• 88% of abortions occur during the first 6 to 12 weeks of pregnancy.
• 60% of abortions are performed on women who already have one or more children.
• 47% of abortions are performed on women who have already had one or more abortions.
• 43% of women will have had at least one abortion by the time they are 45 years old (this statistic includes miscarriages in the term "abortion").

Abortion Statistics - Demographics

• Age - The majority of women getting an abortion are young. 52% are younger than 25 years old and 19% are teenagers. The abortion rate is highest for those women aged 18 to 19 (56 per 1,000 in 1992.)
• Marriage - 51% of women who are unmarried when they become pregnant will receive an abortion. Unmarried women are 6 times more likely than married women to have an abortion. 67% of abortions are from women who have never been married.
• Race - 63% of abortion patients are white, however, black women are more than 3 times as likely to have an abortion, and Hispanic women are 2.5 times as likely.
• Religion - 43% of women getting an abortion claimed they were Protestant, while 27% claimed they were Catholic.

Abortion Statistics - Decisions to Have an Abortion (U.S.)

• 25.5% of women deciding to have an abortion want to postpone childbearing.
• 21.3% of women cannot afford a baby.
• 14.1% of women have a relationship issue or their partner does not want a child.
• 12.2% of women are too young (their parents or others object to the pregnancy.)
• 10.8% of women feel a child will disrupt their education or career.
• 7.9% of women want no (more) children.
• 3.3% of women have an abortion due to a risk to fetal health.
• 2.8% of women have an abortion due to a risk to maternal health.

One hundred, twenty-six thousand abortions a day? Gang, that's FORTY-FIVE MILLION, NINE HUNDRED NINETY THOUSAND abortions A YEAR IN THIS WORLD!!!! I'm just speechless. I'm sorry, but I have nothing wry, witty, smarmy, crass, or anything else to say. The numbers speak for themselves. This is a slippery-slope, folks; and we're losing.