Serious Questions about Pregnancy and Abortion

In a thread on the ethical considerations of abortion, two factual claims were made which have an impact on the overall debate. Both claims were essentially asserted, with little solid material presented (which is not to say that there couldn't be).This thread is NOT about who said what, or about personal commentary at all. It is about providing and analyzing evidentiary material to support/refute such claims, and (if people feel up to it) how their support/refutation effects both sides of the abortion debate. Claim #1 - "The leading cause of death for women worldwide is due to pregnancy and childbirth." One poster limited this to only women 13-18, while another used the broader category. Since neither provided evidence for such claims it is hard to know which is true. The broader statement seemed dubious to me given all the ways people can die, and I had no intrinsic feeling whether it would be true for the limited range. Thus I looked for such stats... Wiki contains a chart breaking down causes of death by the WHO. It was the best/recent list I could find. I do not see any support for either claim. Adding perinatal and maternal causes gives one 51.9 per 100K deaths among women, which is vastly lower than the top five, the top two being cardiovascular disease (278.4) and infectious/paraitic disease (165.1).Is there better data on what % of women die from pregnancy/childbirth as opposed to all other causes? Claim #2 - "we have done those studies where we have taken a random, representative sample of women who have had abortions and followed them for several years. And very, very few of these women suffer depression. Furthermore, the ones who do have problems are likely to have not been emotionally stable before they chose to have the procedure."While proChoice orgs certainly make the above claim, direct refs to these studies have not been made to show/test their validity. Another poster linked to a study whose results conflicted with the above, so I decided to check into it more thoroughly (since I had no idea what the actual state of evidence was). It didn't take long to start finding counter studies. This was a very recent, and comprehensive longterm study on the issue. It contains refs to other studies with counterevidence. Offline it may be found at...Fergusson DM, Horwood LJ, Ridder EM. Abortion in young women and subsequent
mental health. Journal of Child Psychology & Psychiatry, 2006; 47(1): 16-24.Following excerpts are of note... and... They agree that evidence has been weak, but due to conflicting evidence not absence, and flaws within the methodology... The paper goes on to list that study's limitations, but it certainly can't be good if that is the result of the most comprehensive one made... Is there a way to account for the discrepencies in findings by these different studies? What studies showing no harm can we look at as best representative to consider methodological validity/strength?Please no animosity in this thread, or personal commentary. Abortion is always a hot topic, but lets keep this as rational as possible, and evidence focused.Edited by holmes, : making claims stand out

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holmes {in temp decloak from lurker mode}
"What a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away." (D.Bros)

I find that plausible, though I admit to not knowing the facts.The reason I find it plausible, is that as a grad student I walked through some of the cemeteries in New Haven, looking at the enscription on the tombstones. And what stood out was the large number of deaths of relatively young women, related to childbirth.These were from before we had antibiotics available. I'm sure the situation is very different now. But they might be a good indication of what happens in parts of the world where medical care and antibiotics are not readily available to most of the population. It is difficult to know how to read that chart. If a woman becomes infected as a result of childbirth, and dies of that infection, will it be counted in the chart as childbirth related, or will it be counted as death from an infectious disease? I distrust most of the data on this question. Both sides of the debate have axes to grind. Attitudes are sufficiently polarized, that it is difficult to know which surveys are honest. And, even then, the act of following a woman might itself affect the outcome.

An estimated 529,000 women die from pregnancy-related causes according to this site get in the know:questions about pregnancy, contraceptives, and abortion 13% due to unsafe abortions. there are 210 million pregnancies.More women die from heart disease worldwide than anything elseheart disease and the common womenThere are around 3,214,983,000 billion women statistically more women die because of complication from being pregnant abortion leaves mental legacyThis study was done in Oslo, Norway. miscarriages do cause more distress but for a shorter period, and those who have had abortions recover slower. Still the majority, by this study, after having an abortion are not suffering from increased distress.hope these facts help.Edited by alacrity fitzhugh, : those darn errors

Holmes desires that the following claim be examined: According to the data I was able to retrieve from the Disease Control Priorities Project of the World Bank, there is a table 3b.9 in Excel titled Death by Cause, Sex, and Age in the World 2001 available at: dcp2.org - SARMs, Supplements And KratomAccording to the data for females ages 15-29 in deaths by thousands:Infectuous and parasitic diseases: 630k
Maternal conditions: 257k
Noncommunicible disease: 299k
Injuries: 359kAccording to the data for females ages 30-44 in deaths by thousands:Infectuous and parasitic diseases: 672k
Maternal conditions: 233k
Noncommunicible disease: 653k
Injuries: 309kCause of death worldwide by HIV/AIDS alone is 385k for 15-29 and 426k for 30-44.Also, abortions are listed under maternal deaths as 44k for 15-29 and 22k for 30-44.The above data is only as reliable as the source, which is the World Bank.Additionally, I provide this data in fulfillment of a request and am not interested in debating on this subject. Edited by anglagard, : Deleted personal opinion.

Isn't this just a matter of perspective? What if it is really the other way around, and anyone who wouldn't suffer some kind of emotional problem from killing a future person is really already screwd up in the head, or, for the benefit of the doubt, brain washed to believe that what they are doing is perfectly ok. Hence the matter of perspective.I think that statistic is pure bullshit.I passed a billboard on the highway today, with an 800# for woman who suffer from depression after an abortion, so it is a real issue, and I don't believe the problem is with the woman, and that she should not feel depressed, but that the problem is with our society and how we value life, and morals. You can't change what is.

Pregnancy and its complications is the leading cause of death for women 15-19, according to the fifth annual State of the World's Mothers report, a survey put out by an international charity. Page not found | Save the Children InternationalBeyond that, preganancy is one of the leading causes of death in all countries among all women, according to the UN's Reproductive Health Fact Sheet: Page 404I don't see it as accurate to say that pregnancy is the number-one-with-a-bullet cause of death for all women, but clearly, pregnancy is a significant risk for all women no matter where you live, but most especially in the developing world.

One could also take this view. Pregnancy is not a significant risk factor for women in developing countries. Not having access to proper medical care is a significant risk factor to all people in developing countries. Living in a developing country is a significant risk factor to one's health in general.

First of all I want to thank everyone for their response. This is a reply to everyone, and will address comments/data made by others here, but I'm replying to crash's post in particular because his was the last on the page (when I started typing) and presented some evidence in support of claim #1.What I'd like to do is look at what we have so far and see if we can reach an agreement on what evidence we have so far. CLAIM #1 (pregnancy risk) Okay I looked at the save the children link and did not find any real data to support their claim. It appeared to be a politically motivated group whose concerns were about spreading a universal moral stance on sex, using assertions about pregnancy risk to try and scare up support. Not only were they lacking any hard data, the principle claim seems to have come from themselves.Your second link (which is listed as a ref by the above) was more fruitful... This certainly seems better supported, and one that does seem intuitive. I believe NWR mentioned something which I agreed with, that made the limited range claim seem plausible (even if I had to admit I just didn't know). Within developing nations with low medical technology/availability pregnancy is much more risky.Looking at the stats within the UN report we see it is not that pregnancy in and of itself is a leading cause of death worldwide, but rather lack of medical technology/availability in developing nations and the great numbers of people in them make pregnancy statistically one of (but not the top) leading cause of death of women worldwide. Inside developed nations such a claim does not see much support.Also a very LARGE caveat must be placed on the data we are looking at, given within the UN report itself. Its a potent reminder that statistics cannot just be looked at to derive conclusions, but the methods and context of the data understood. This is what they said... and more importantly... and finally (beyond just drawing conclusions on trends)... That last one is a whopper of a revelation. Because they THINK there may be underestimates due to developed statistical system the authors PADDED THE DATA by up to 50%, then excuse that activity by saying such a degree of padding is not an exaggeration DESPITE the fact that it could just as easily be lower.That is a bit shocking and politically motivated to my mind. It is NOT very scientific at all. Again, this should be a potent reminder to look past the data to understand the data. NEWLY ADDED INFO: I went back to check something in the data and IT MUST BE NOTED that the given RATES INCLUDE ABORTION! Thus the stats cannot be used to argue for abortion based on inherent risk of pregnancy anywhere, much less developing nations. This is yet another reminder to CHECK THE METHODS, definitions are crucial as they may include categories one does not expect.

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I might also add that the basic info page you linked to (not the UN report) states that pregnancy in developing countries lead to less than 1% of deaths worldwide. According to the poster whose quote I used for Claim #1, that would mean pregnancy is wholly insignificant as a factor in developing nations when discussing risk of pregnancy worldwide. That underscores a question of whether we are looking at the risk of being pregnant (including to carry and to abort) in general, or just where medical technology is unavailable.Okay with all these caveats in mind, I think we can move toward a conclusion that is agreeable.Could we say then that pregnancy carries physical risks such that where medical help is not available it is one of the leading causes of death in women of childbearing age? CLAIM #2 - (abortion risk to mental health)Alacrity listed a Norwegian study which found that depression rates among those who have chosen abortion are less than miscarriage in the short term, yet much higher as time goes on (that is they do not reduce as with natural loss). While it certainly does not show a majority of women suffering from such problems, it does show a much larger percentage (20-25%) than proChoice orgs suggest in their material using older studies.Since the study was not linked to directly, I cannot analyze the methodology, however it does mirror findings in the study I linked to originally.NWR stated... I agree that discovering an answer to the question is problematic and prone to inclusion of bias. HOWEVER, I found the recent study to be sober in its analysis and wonder what problems you had with it from the aspect of bias?The fact that more studies are discovering this same phenomena regarding mental health , especially recent studies in societies that are not a vociferously anti abortion as the US, tends to suggest there might be something there.I agree it does not necessarily point to the tools of abortion creating a trauma in some mechanistic sense, but it could very well have to do with feelings of violation or doing something "bad" (by killing a part of onesself or another life) inherent to the procedure one goes through.Even the earlier studies admitted a small number suffered effects. They merely asserted it must be due to preconditions, and not significant to worry about. More recent studies looked at the possibility of preconditions and did not find support for that, neither did they find such low numbers.While one can question the validity of studies in a generic way, it is not appropriate to deny the validity of studies based solely on that doubt.Can we agree that accumulating scientific evidence shows that while a majority of women do not suffer negative mental health effects from abortion, there is a significant percentage that show problems, perhaps less than for miscarriage in an immediate sense but more so with time? And at the very least the conclusions based on prior studies have been thrown into question?Thanks again all.Edited by holmes, : major addition regarding UN data

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holmes {in temp decloak from lurker mode}
"What a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away." (D.Bros)

I'm not sure you can say it is not a significant risk factor, just not among the leading factors. I guess I'd like to see a definition of what makes something significant before I could agree. I think most would agree to this, and I do think using pregnancy risk stats from developing nations are a bit disigenuous to making conclusions about pregnancy in general. However, it does seem that pregnancy does pose some form of increased risk, and I'm not sure one can just assume/discuss medical technology of developed nations as if that is some natural part of pregnancy.Shoot, I just realized I may have missed something. What are the risks for women having abortions in developing countries? Intuitively that would also have to carry risk and one wonders what the difference is between carrying to term or having an abortion there. Did abortion deaths get lumped into "maternal" deaths in these stats?

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holmes {in temp decloak from lurker mode}
"What a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away." (D.Bros)

I just found this paper from 2005, that states that abortion does not influence on depression rates. It suggests that some studies show otherwise, since women who selfreport their abortions might also report more on depression symptoms http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/...dpdf/bmj.38623.532384.55v1.pdf

But even in a developed country, such as ours, pregnancy is a significant risk to the mother's health. Throughout the developed countries, one in every 1800 women will die due to being pregnant.

Yeah, Holmes, I guess your attack thread is completely right on. Pregnancy is absolutely safe for literally every woman, every single time; abortion is dangerous and will make you kill yourself; and women who want to determine what human beings are allowed to live within them should be ashamed of themselves for being sluts.I guess I'm curious - if you find the danger that pregnancy represents to health an unreasonable justification for abortion, what justification do you find reasonable? I don't recall you offering such a justification in any of your posts. Or do you even support the rights of women to decide who is allowed to take up residence inside their bodies in the first place?

Attack thread??? I never said anything like the above. I haven't even suggested what conclusions may be drawn from the studies so as to impact the abortion debate.We are looking at studies, and trying to come to an agreement on evidence so that we can move from there. In my summary I suggested possible agreeable position based on that state of evidence, here I will retouch them a bit...1) Pregnancy does inherently provide risk such that in regions without medical technology/availability it is one of the leading causes of death for reproductive age women. We could also add: For those in the developing world there is much less risk, such that it is not nearly a leading cause of death, yet it is not risk free.2) While not conclusive, there is recent data which shows longterm mental health issues for some women who have had abortions. This is for a minority of women, though much larger than what previous studies had indicated.I really am trying to reach a noncombative consensus by just looking at/analyzing the data. Is there something wrong with the above positions? If so what is your specific complaint based on evidence we have available to us? I have never said that, nor have I implied that. I am simply looking at the evidence we have about risks associated with pregnancy, specifically using a claim made earlier as an earmark to seek/refute/generate a more accurate assessment.Once we had consensus I figured some might want to discuss how that effects the overall debate. (Peeking ahead) Personally, I believe any amount of risk is sufficient to allow a woman to choose to end a pregnancy. I also believe a woman should be allowed to end a pregnancy even of there were 0 risk, based on other concerns including the welfare of the child (potential disabilities/economic conditions) and herself (economic/social conditions). If I honestly believed a "who" was "taking up residence" inside a woman's body, I'd probably be against allowing abortion. To my mind it is a gestational process taking place in a woman's body (in fact we can do some of it outside their bodies), and does not result in a "who" for some time (perhaps not even at birth though that is a convenient point for consideration). And the "what" does not "reside", but rather just gestates according to its natural process. It makes sense that if a woman is going to eliminate potential problems stemming from implantation of an embryo, it should be during that gestation period, preferably early.In future posts, please refrain from character judgements or jumping to conclusions about how a person might use evidence within the overall debate. Could we start with a simple agreement or explanation for disagreement with the above points?Edited by holmes, : quote fix

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holmes {in temp decloak from lurker mode}
"What a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away." (D.Bros)

Then I don't see the utility in a precise specification of the risk. If any at all is sufficient, then what's the purpose of this thread aside from simply allowing you to, once again, portray yourself as the superior arbiter of what is true or untrue?I simply don't see what's going on here that you expect to be interesting. If you say so. Honestly I don't see that as a discussion that goes anywhere - like all discussions that are basically about what words mean. How boring! And how impossible to arrive at any sort of consensus. I don't see the difference. A human being is residing within the uterus of another. That's what gestation entails for the mother. Why would a human being have the right to do that against the permission of the owner of the uterus?

Before answering anything else, are you in agreement with the positions regarding the state of scientific evidence on these claims? If not, why not, and what could be changed? While any amount of risk is sufficient for my position, others have different positions where this would be important. Clearly you and another poster found it important to your position and others might as well. Thus it becomes useful to explore.Also, I am just plain curious what the real risk is. I did not find support for the claims made and would like to have better/more correct info if it is out there.Now I would turn the tables and ask why it would NOT be of interest to you, since it was a factual statement you made? Isn't it important/interesting to find out what the actual state of evidence is regarding that fact? Well most people have agreed that birth is the demarcation of when "personhood" begins, so that is a form of consensus. That said I think you are right that it would be hard to get some sort of unanimous consensus on when a fetus becomes a "who". I wasn't the one pressing for people to accept my position regarding that, or trying to address it as a topic in this thread. I don't view gestational entities as human beings. They are cellular life of human origin, but hardly "beings".If pregnancy involved the "humunculus" version of gestation, with a minute but fully developed human being inside a womb, my opinion would be vastly different regarding whether abortion should be allowed. Of course it would still depend on consciousness/awareness of that being too.There certainly are situations where people do become responsible for taking care of others. That goes double for anyone who has engaged in a behavior which risked such an entanglement. Like say a bunch of people decide to go mountainclimbing and wind up in a position of having to take care of a friend to bring the person back to safety though it might risk their own life. They seem obliged to do so to me.But pregnancy is not like that (to me) because we are talking about cellular life which is in the process of becoming a human being. Until it is such a thing, other considerations for the mother may be overriding.Unfortunately this is to digress. The main points here is the degree of physical risk posed by pregnancy and mental risk by abortion, and how that would impact the abortion debate for people... not just me.

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holmes {in temp decloak from lurker mode}
"What a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away." (D.Bros)