The Physical Risk Of Abortions

The practice of abortions throughout the United States are safe. Abortions have become safer since the procedure was reluctantly legalized in the United States-by the Supreme Court-in 1973. According to The American Medical Association’s Council on Scientific Affairs the number of deaths associated with abortion drastically dropped from roughly four out of every one hundred thousand women in 1973 to .6 per every one hundred thousand women in 1997 (Abortion is Safe). These statistics show that procedure in how an abortion is performed has become safer since legalization. Legalization of abortion permitted the procedure to be performed in a sterile setting- such as a hospital operating room. The medical risk associated with an abortion procedure is highly overestimated. An abortion performed exactly as medically advised carries half the risk of a tonsillectomy (Abortion is Safe). (A tonsillectomy is a simple procedure that is performed on many children in their childhood.) On the other hand, anti-abortion advocates point to emotional problems that could harm the pregnant woman after an abortion. These advocates attempt to show there is a link to mental disorders in post abortion women. A New Zealand study looked to verify this claim. The analysis showed that there was a credible link between depression, suicide attempts and substance abuse in post abortion women (Cords). Researchers also aimed to connect having an abortion with post-traumatic stress disorder

In the United States today, 25% of all pregnancies end in abortion (Abortion: All Sides). With so many lives in the balance, one of the primary arguments has become the physical health of women who have abortions. Of the women that previously had a surgical abortion 90% said they would prefer the pill if they had another abortion and would recommend it to others (Robinson). However one of the side effects of RU 486 is bleeding up to 9 days, compared to a surgical abortion’s five day duration (Robinson). The recovery process is quicker with a surgical abortion but more traumatic. One death in 200,000 occur with a surgical abortion, compared to one in 500,000 with the abortion pill. Both of these alternatives are far safer for the mother than childbirth that claims one death in every 14,300 births (Robinson). These statistics prove that the safest alternative for the mother in the event of a pregnancy is an abortion using the abortion pill and the most dangerous is going through with childbirth. However the safest thing for the child is natural childbirth by far. The voice of the life in question is never heard and it has a one hundred percent chance of death in the first 2 cases.

This paper will explore the many facets of abortion. For organizational purposes, it will first provide

Abortion really today has been a very controversial issue in today’s society. An interesting claim within it is that abortion can be done safely through the use of medical abortion and although medical abortions can be safe and trustworthy as experts might say, there still are risks that women will have to face and eventually take after abortion. Major types of risks can be pelvic infections, blood clots in the uterus or maybe a torn cervix. These are just few out of many health problems caused from abortion.

Women may have an abortion for a variety of reasons, but in general they choose abortion because a pregnancy at that time is in some way wrong for them. “Abortion is the removal of a fetus from the uterus before it is mature enough to live on its own” (Kuechler 1996). When this happens spontaneously we call it a miscarriage. Induced abortion is brought about deliberately by a medical procedure that ends pregnancy. Legal abortion, carried out by trained medical practitioners, is one of the most common and safest surgical procedures. “About 1.5 million American women choose to have induced abortions each year. Less than 1% of all abortion patients experience a major complication associated with the procedure” (Kuechler 1996).

Doctors’ view is also very much negative about abortion. A study was conducted by the Journal of Medical Ethics on 733 medical students about abortion. The outcome of the survey revealed that almost 1/3 of students would not perform an abortion for a congenitally malformed fetus after 24 weeks, 1∕4 of them would not perform an abortion for failed contraception before 24 weeks and 1/5 of them would not perform an abortion on a minor who was the victim of rape. (Campbell,

Before abortion was made legal in 1973, women would seek illegal methods called “back-alley” abortions. These methods were performed at home with coat hangers and knitting needles, by medical professionals, or by the use of herbs. Health Research Funding estimates that five to ten thousand women died each year due to illegal procedures. Illegal procedure would also cause infertility among women due to the injuries sustained. Thankfully, with the passing of Roe V. Wade, abortions today are much safer. The American Medical Association and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists stated “Abortion is one the safest medical procedures performed in the United States.” A woman’s risk of dying from a modern abortion is 0.6 in 100,000 while the risk of dying from giving birth is around 14 times higher at 8.8 in 100,000. A study by Obstetrics & Gynecology in January of 2015 reported that less than 2.5% of the 1.21 million abortions every year lead to major health

Abortion has always been a controversial topic in the United States for decades. Abortion is like taking the life of someone without their permission so it is technically “murder”. There is no such thing as an unwanted child, millions of families in the United States are always willing to adopt. On the other hand, there are circumstances where a woman can barely care and sustain herself so chances are that she will not be able to take care of her child. Or when a rape occurs, having an abortion is not as bad as when a woman has sex without protection and knows she has the chance to get pregnant.

Abortion is a debatable question that has been argued over a long period of time. The controversy of abortion has caused or may cause deaths and several violent conflicts between, should abortion be legal or illegal. Abortion is one of the most common medical procedures performed worldwide also known as elective termination of pregnancy (History,2016). Abortion is the destruction of the fetus or unborn child while the child is still in the mother’s womb. This procedure can be done almost anyone from the mother herself to back alley, most common, abortion clinics. More than 40% of all women will end a pregnancy by abortion and remains common in the US. But the questions is should abortion be legal or illegal?

Statement of Problem: Abortion is defined as the deliberate termination of a human pregnancy, most often performed during the first 28 weeks of pregnancy. Today, especially here in the United States of America, there is a growing issue and debate around the idea of abortion. There is a stigma against abortion because of the possibility of negative religious, political, medical, emotional, and mental consequences it may cause. Each year, worldwide there is an estimated 42 billion abortions that take place. This number does not include abortions that are not performed by professionals. The big issue alongside with abortion itself, is the affects it has on the mental health of females who undergo the procedure.

Given the recognized variety of investments and actors in providing safe abortion services to women in the world, yet complications of abortion are one of the leading causes of maternal mortality. Professional associations have a responsibility to ensure that women’s abortion care services including safe abortion care are improving. FIGO is dedicated to the improvement of women’s health and rights, including promoting safe abortion care. In support of these, the national obstetrics and gynecology associations should play a great role in the abortion advocacy work to provide abortion services to women in the country.

Although experiences are subjective, women that have later abortions tend to feel more pain and distress following the procedure and so early abortion on a personal level, is preferred (British Pregnancy Advisory Service 2010). Delays caused by the complexity of regulation can therefore, not only intensify unpleasantness but intensify health risks. The law fails to recognise the responsibility of the role of nurses in abortion practise today. It needs to be updated so that nurses can continue to lead the abortion process but without obtaining the signature of two doctors. Training programmes should be offered to nurses to qualify them in independently carrying out abortions at all gestation stages. These reforms would avoid time wasting. More time would enable more available appointments for termination. Ultimately, it would break the barrier of accessing abortion at an early stage (Furedi 2008).

It is considered by World Health Organization that one fourth of all the progenies in the world terminate in induced abortion. More precisely, the number of induced abortion is nearly 50 million every year（Berer, M., 2000 ）. Induced abortion means “abortion brought on deliberately by drugs or mechanical means” (Stedman, T. L.，2008). It can be defined as an abortion that is preceded initiatively, which is opposite to spontaneous abortion. According to World HeaWHO

Abortion is a highly-debated topic of whether it is ethical for a woman to decide to have one. Abortion is any of various surgical methods for deliberately terminating a pregnancy. When we speak of abortion today, we mean induced abortion performed by trained doctors, not including miscarriage (MacKinnon & Fiala, 2015). Some current methods of abortion are morning-after pill, mifepristone, uterine or vacuum aspiration, dilation and curettage, saline solution, prostaglandin drugs, hysterotomy, and partial birth abortion. Abortion involves questions about rights, happiness, and well-being, as well as the status and value of human life. The people who think it is ethical to have an abortion stand on the Pro-choice side and the people who think it is unethical stand on the Pro-life side. The liberal view of abortion supports abortions and the conservative view opposes abortion. There are many legal, religious, and medical conflicts that are included in the debate over abortion. The arguments made from both sides help us better understand whether a woman should have an abortion.

Many women that choose to have an abortion do not realize that it is a dangerous surgery with serious side effects. These side effects are both physical and psychological. Having an abortion is unnatural and interrupts this function of the human body. “The women’s body naturally resists the abortion, causing physical and emotional problems” (“Who does Abortion Affect?”). Almost all of the women who had abortions feel that they have made the wrong decision. The women are not informed about the side effects of abortion. Many women that had abortions said their doctors gave “little or no information about the potential health risks