United Nations Report: Making Abortion Illegal Doesn’t Increase Women’s Deaths
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by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
February 20, 2006
New York, NY (LifeNews.com) — Abortion advocates made the argument to legalize abortion in the United States and they make the same one to topple pro-life laws in other nations: making abortion illegal will increase women’s deaths. However, a new report from the United Nations indicates that’s just not so.
According to new figures from the United Nations Populations Division, nations with laws legalizing abortion have not seen a corresponding drop in the rate of maternal deaths.
They do not experience lower rates of maternal mortality compared to nation’s that have made abortions illegal.
The information is found in the "World Mortality Report: 2005" which the Population Division released last month. The UN says it’s the first of its kind and registers maternal and infant mortality for every nation.
According to the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute, a pro-life group that lobbies at the UN, the report reveals that Russia, where abortion has long been considered a form of birth control, a maternal mortality rate of 67 deaths for every 100,000 births.
The rate is 17 deaths for every 100,000 births in the United States, which also has very permissive abortion laws.
On the other hand, CFHRI reports in its Friday Fax that Ireland and Poland have lower rates. Both countries have come under strong protest from abortion advocates, who even sent an abortion ship to Poland in order to promote abortions there.
Ireland has the lowest maternal mortality rate of Poland, the U.S. and Russia with just 5 deaths for every 100,000 births. Poland’s is also lower with 13 deaths for every 100,000 births.
Pro-abortion laws also do not decrease infant mortality, even when the number of abortions is subtracted from the number of infant deaths.
Ireland has the lowest rate at 6 deaths for every 1,000 live births, both Poland and the U.S. are at 7 deaths for every 1,000 live babies born, and pro-abrotion Russia has the highest at 12 deaths per 1,000 babies born.
While abortion advocates exaggerated the number of women who died from abortions prior to it becoming legal in 1973, Dr. Bernard Nathanson, the former founder of NARAL, admitted that his group drastically inflated the number of abortions deaths to grab media attention.
Meanwhile, other reports have shown that the advancement of medical technology, including the invention of penicillin, led to a decrease in the number of illegal abortion deaths — not legalizing abortion.
