Why Call For Life? - Other Articles

In 2002, 1.29 million abortions occurred.

At current rates, about one in three American women will have had an abortion by the time she reaches age 45.

88% of abortions occur in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy.

A broad cross section of U.S. women have abortions.
56% of women having abortions are in their 20s;
61% have one or more children;
67% have never married;
57% are economically disadvantaged;
88% live in a metropolitan area; and
78% report a religious affiliation.

•Religious affiliation. The majority of women older than 17 who obtained an abortion reported a religious affiliation. The highest proportion (43%) identified themselves as Protestant. Twenty-seven percent of women having an abortion identified themselves as Catholic, and 8% as a member of another religion; 22% reported no religious affiliation. Thirteen percent identified themselves as "born-again" or evangelical, three-fourths of whom were Protestant (not shown).

The study found that 46% of women having abortions were not using a contraceptive method in the month they became pregnant, including 8% who had never practiced contraception. Among the many reasons that women gave for not using contraceptives, the most common were that they did not think they would become pregnant (33%), they had concerns about methods (32%), including side effects and problems with methods in the past, and they did not expect to have sex (26%). Other reasons why women were not using contraceptives included the following:

• they had not thought about contraception or had not yet begun using a method (22%);

• they had problems accessing contraception (12%);

• they were ambivalent about pregnancy (5%);

• they did not want their parents to know they were sexually active (2%); and

• they were forced to have sex (1%).

More than half of women (54%) were using a contraceptive method in the month they became pregnant, mainly relying on condoms (28% of all women having abortions) and oral contraceptive pills (14%). These women commonly reported that they had become pregnant despite using a contraceptive because they had used the method inconsistently (76% of pill users, 49% of condom users). Furthermore, 42% of condom users indicated that the condom had broken or slipped out of place.

Statistics From the Guttmacher Institute

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