Restrictive laws do not necessarily lower abortion rates

2016-07-01

TRACKING abortion rates is a hard task. Some countries under-report them, and many do not report them at all. A new paper published in the Lancet, led by Gilda Sedgh of the Guttmacher Institute, and the World Health Organisation, is only the fourth such study, and supersedes previous estimates that are considered too conservative. The authors (who also produced the last study four years ago) estimate that the global rate fell slightly from 40 abortions per 1,000 women aged 15-44 in 1990, to 35 in 2014. But this masks a wide variation by income and by region. In the developed world, rates declined dramatically from 46 to 27 as better family planning and education became available to women to prevent unintended pregnancies. The steepest drop was seen in eastern Europe following the break-up of the Soviet Union, as women gained access to family planning and modern contraception. By contrast, the abortion rate has stayed relatively unchanged in developing regions and the share of pregnancies ending in abortion has nudged up from 21% to 24%. This matters: 50m of the 56m abortions every year are in developing countries. In Latin America, which has restrictive abortion laws and the highest abortion rates, one in three pregnancies ended in abortion in 2014, higher than any other region. Restrictive laws do not appear to lower the number of procedures, but do increase the likelihood of health risks to women who must seek unsafe procedures. Around $300m a year is spent treating an estimated 7m women who suffer complications after unsafe abortions.