Rate of US abortions drops to lowest level since 1973.
I don’t believe it - and The Guardian should know better.
Thanks to Rethuglicans making abortions illegal, it has all been pushed underground at best - and those terminations are not included in the analysis.
@JohnPhilpin Honestly, I think it may have more to do with the fact that Obamacare now overs birth control. States where Republicans have outlawed it are in the minority.
@stevepbrady @JohnPhilpin I believe historically abortions have decreased under democrat party administrations due to a focus on lifting people up. My main beef with the Evangelical/Catholic/Republican approach to abortion is it assumes the main reason why a woman has an abortion is because it is legal, whereas the reason a woman has an abortion is because she got pregnant. A focus on the preventing unwanted pregnancies and supporting those who do become pregnant will be more effective in decreasing the number of abortions, which should be the real goal.
@stevepbrady I don’t have the data to support this but that doesn’t matter anymore ( so I’m told) but I bet there are more unwanted pregnancies in those ‘few’ states than in all the other states added together.
@stevepbrady and don’t forget it’s not just making it illegal - it’s making it hard ... with the same result as if it was illegal
@JohnPhilpin I guess I'm biased living in New England. We're pretty progressive here and it's not really an issue.
@stevepbrady ... and I live in Cali-for-ni-a … but just like New England, it doesn’t matter to us - for a start we are both male.
BUT it does matter to women who want an abortion who live in Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, North Dakota, Ohio …
So far, just in 2019 - 12 states have enacted abortion BANS.
Again - not in CA and not in NH - but it is clear that there is a move towards repealing Roe/Wade.
And even if they don’t ... think what is going on with emission levels right now.
Trump is planning to revoke California's authority to set its own vehicle emission standards.
Now take that logic and apply it to abortions.
Of course - he has to still be President in 2021 for this to really take shape - but that battle is far form a slam dunk.
@JohnPhilpin No, I see your point. Let's just hope the Dems don't shoot themselves in the foot and have their candidate drift so far to the left they become unelectable.
@stevepbrady biden, warren and sanders account for over 60% of democratic preferences right now ... so in reality i am expecting one of them to emerge at the top of the heap … are they all centrist enough - or are then veering towards electability problems?
@JohnPhilpin I think Warren and Sanders will have problems. But Biden's age scares me too. Wish Booker would catch on.
@JohnPhilpin I haven’t taken the time to read the report yet, but from the fact sheet’s first chart, it looks like abortions have been declining linearly since about 1981. Not to say that the Right isn’t trying to create Gilead and it’s getting worse for women all over the country, but I’d guess the decline is tied to very long term trends. //@stevepbrady
@Bruce yup - wikipedia - reflects the same long term trends ( i guess cos it is the same source) - but that said - there’s this …
”Medical abortions voluntarily reported to the CDC by 34 reporting areas (excluding Alabama, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Hawaii, Illinois, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Vermont, Wisconsin, and Wyoming) and published in its annual abortion surveillance reports have increased every year since the September 28, 2000
the states excluded are almost none of the states that I highlighted where i said abortion access is being restricted - where abortions would be decreasing - so pulling overall average down ?
@JohnPhilpin Perhaps. I really should take time to look at the actual data. Though California, Florida, and Pennsylvania being excluded from the CDC reports jumps out at me—that’s over 20% of the US population.
@Bruce a more useful comp would be population in the (roughly) 16 to 40 years age range PLUS socio economic status .
@JohnPhilpin I browsed through some of the source articles and it looks like the causes are probably mixed. From Abortion Incidence and Service Availability In the United States:*
However, regional patterns in clinic numbers did not always correspond with changes in abortion rates, as rate declines were steepest in the West and the South (both 16%) and lowest in the Midwest (9%). And while the Northeast had more clinics providing abortion care in 2014 than in 2011, that region's abortion rate declined 11%.
and:
Abortion is an important indicator of unintended pregnancy, but it is unclear whether the most recent decline in abortion is due to fewer women's having unintended pregnancies, more women's being unable to access abortion services or some combination of these dynamics.
* I got free access to the article via my NYPL card.