Abortion and women's reproductive health

Abstract

Nothing in the field of health care generates more controversy worldwide than does the issue of abortion. And, unfortunately, there is nothing to suggest that these controversies will decrease in the coming years. For those who believe that life begins at the time of fertilization or at the time of implantation, there is no middle ground: abortion for them equates with murder of the ‘unborn child’. Similarly for those who believe that women must have the ultimate right to decide about their bodies, there is no middle ground either: for them women must be able to decide whether or not to carry a pregnancy to term. Thus, there is every indication that the issue of abortion is one that will continue to be unresolvable at any time in the future. Where abortion is legal, there will be continued advocacy and pressure to make it illegal and vice versa. But the question is not really whether or not abortion should be legal or illegal, but whether or not it should be safe or unsafe [l]. In all societies, no matter the legal, moral or cultural status of abortion, there will be some women who desperately seek to terminate an unwanted pregnancy. And in almost all societies, it is the poor and the young who disproportionately suffer the consequences of illegal abortion. Wealthier and better educated women usually will find the means to terminate a pregnancy more safely than will the poor. Kenneth Ryan, a distinguished Catholic American academician and Professor and Chairman Emeritus of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Harvard University, recently quoted a statement from a paper he wrote in 1967 [2] as follows: