Abortion, understood as when a pregnancy is forcibly ended, is mainly done to avoid childbirth due to certain personal choices (1✔). Reasons for abortion include, unwanted pregnancy caused by improper family planning, when the baby in the womb has severe abnormalities or when it is medically dangerous for the mother to deliver a baby.
Facts on Abortion
- Each year, there are about 73 million cases of abortion reported worldwide (2✔).
- In 2020, nearly 57.2% women had an abortion by the age of 20 (3✔).
- According to a study published in 2015, an estimated 15.6 million abortions were performed in India. Abortions were performed at a rate of 47.0 per 1000 women aged 15 to 49 years (4✔).
- There were about 214,256 abortions in England and Wales, the highest number since the Abortion Act was introduced (5✔).
- From 56 million abortions worldwide, nearly 25 million abortions were unsafe. In those, nearly 8 million were carried out in the least- safe environment (6✔).
- In 2015, nearly three out of four unsafe abortions occurred in Africa and Latin America. The risk of maternal deaths due to unsafe abortions is the highest in Africa.
- Every year, nearly 4.7%- 13.2% of maternal deaths are due to unsafe abortions (2✔).
- In India, a majority of abortions (81%) were done using medication, also called medical methods of abortion, or MMA (4✔).
- Around 45% of all abortions are unsafe, and of those, 97% take place in developing countries (7✔).
- Medication abortions account for nearly 31% of all non-hospital abortions in the United States (8✔).
- Abortions when done during the first trimester (up to 14 weeks of gestation since the first day of the last menstrual period), are considered to be the safest as they carry minimal risks (9✔).
- The abortion-associated death risk may increase with the length of the pregnancy. The death risk ranges from 0.3 for every 100,000 abortions at eight weeks to 6.7 for every 100,000 at 18 weeks (10✔).
- In the UK, nearly 90 percent of abortions take place very early in pregnancy in the first 12 weeks (3✔).
- In the US, as of January 1, 2018, all except ten states have imposed one of five major abortion restrictions. According to this, unnecessary regulations on abortion clinics cannot be put, couples or single mothers will have compulsory counseling sessions to dissuade them from having an abortion, a waiting period is mandatory before an abortion is carried out and parental involvement is required before a minor citizen obtains an abortion and there also needs to be a prohibition on the use of state Medicaid funds to pay for medically necessary abortions.
- In the UK, Abortion is legal up-to-the 24th week of pregnancy. After 24 weeks of pregnancy, abortion is very uncommon, and it can only take place if there is a serious risk of maternal death or if the unborn child has severe disabilities (11✔).
