Australia Poll Finds Majority of Australians Pro-Abortion, Change From 20 Years Ago
by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
October 5, 2009
Canberra, Australia (LifeNews.com) — The results of a poll taken during the 2007 elections in Australia have been released and they show that a majority of Australians support abortion. The findings, from the Australian Election Study, are based on polling 1873 voters during the elections two years ago.
According to the Brisbane Times newspaper, 57 percent support legal abortions while 33 percent take a pro-life position by opposing virtually all abortions except those in "special circumstances" like rape and incest.
Another 4 percent of Australians want all abortions made illegal.
That 57-37 percent split is a significant change from 20 years ago when a similar poll found just 38 percent agreed with legal abortions.
The study shows a lower level of support for abortion among Catholics, with just 45 percent saying they back legal abortions. Members of conservative evangelical denominations like the Baptist Church and Pentecostal Church are even more likely to oppose abortion.
People between the ages of 18-44 are more likely to support abortion, the poll found, while a smaller majority of Australians supported abortion in the 45-74 age range. Only those above the age of 75 opposed legal abortions by a majority.
The support for abortion came regardless of the major political party — Liberal or Labor — the voter affiliate with, the survey found. Thus, it is no surprise that 77 percent of the federal candidates for Parliament support abortion.
The study is published in People and Place, a journal of the Centre for Population and Urban Research at Monash University.
Last year, a study found two-thirds of the women seeking abortions did so because their contraception failed.
The study included 3,400 women who went to an abortion business in Adelaide over the course of a decade.
Conducted by Flinders University professors Wendy Abigail, Charmaine Power and Ingrid Belan, it found 70 percent of the women seeking abortions used birth control.
About 36 percent of the women and their partners used condoms to prevent pregnancy, another 28 percent used hormonal methods such as the birth control pill and three percent were relying on natural family planning.
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