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AN UPDATE FROM LIFE
ISSUES INSTITUTE
By Richard D. Glasow, Ph.D.
Abortion Providers Decrease, Chemical Abortions
Increase in mid-1990s, Survey Shows
The number of abortions and abortion providers in the U.S.
declined dramatically from 1992 to 1996, reported a survey
released in December, 1998 by a leading pro-abortion research
organization. The survey also indicated that the number of
chemical abortions and chemical abortion providers increased
significantly in 1996 and 1997.
None of these trends was entirely unexpected. For several
years, abortion advocates have decried the decline in the
number of abortionists. They hope that marketing of both the
dangerous RU 486/Cytotec prostaglandin (RU 486/PG) and the
methotrexate/Cytotec (MTX/PG) abortion techniques would reverse
that trend by encouraging more physicians, including family
practitioners, to perform abortions. (See March-April, 1998
The RU 486 Report for details, which can be found on
the Life Issues Institute Internet website: http://www.Lifeissues.org)
The survey was reported in an article titled “Abortion
Incidence and Services in the United States, 1995-1996”
in the November/December 1998 issue of Family Planning
Perspectives, published by the Alan Guttmacher Institute
(AGI). AGI is the special research affiliate of the Planned
Parenthood Federation of America, the nation's largest provider
and promoter of abortion. This survey “presents the
most comprehensive current and trend data on the incidence
and prevalence of abortion in the United States, and characteristics
of facilities providing abortion services,” stated AGI's
press release.
Decline in Abortionists and Abortions
According to AGI, there were 338 fewer facilities providing
abortions in 1996 compared to 1992—a drop to 2,042 from
2,380 (a decrease of 14%). “There are now nearly one-third
fewer providers than the peak number in 1982 (2,908),”
said the press release.
The article indicated that “those who discontinued
abortion services were mainly physicians' offices, and hospitals
particularly in rural areas.” The article claimed that
86% of all U.S. counties—where 32% of all women lived—did
not have an abortion provider. Moreover, abortion services
are not available in one-third of U.S. cities—89 of
320 metropolitan areas.
All measures of abortion have dropped in the 1990s. The number
of abortions, the rate (defined as the number of abortions
per 1,000 women aged 15-44), and the ratio (the percentage
of pregnancies that end in abortion) are “now at their
lowest in 20 years,” observed the press release.
“The study's author and other experts attribute the
sharp drop (in abortionists) to intense opposition from antiabortion
foes,” stated the December 11, 1998 Washington Post.
“But also driving the decline, they say, is a changing
health care system. Fewer doctors are being trained to perform
abortions, providers are moving out of rural areas, and physicians
and hospitals are increasingly sending patients to specialized
clinics, where 91 percent of abortions are now performed,”
said the Post.
In 1996, there were 1.37 million abortions, stated the report.
This would be about 3,753 per day.
Between 1992 and 1996, the number of U.S. abortions fell
11% from 1.53 to 1.37 million, and the rate decreased 12%
from 26 to 23 per 1,000 women aged 15-44, said the report.
Also, the steady decline in the number of abortions and the
rate of abortions appears to have leveled off. The number
and the rate were about the same in 1995 and 1996.
The abortion industry is concentrated in a relatively small
number of locations. Seventy percent of abortions took place
in 22% (452) of the total number of U.S. facilities.
According to AGI, 26% of pregnancies (excluding miscarriages)
ended in abortion. (This is the abortion ratio.) The ratio
has decreased since 1990, when it was 28%.
Chemical Abortions Increase
For the first time in its series of 12 national surveys,
AGI collected data about the incidence of chemical abortions
performed at nonhospital facilities. (The term used in AGI's
report was “medical abortion,” which is completely
misleading since a death drug for an unborn child is not “medicine.”)
The survey included both the RU 486/PG and MTX/PG methods.
In the survey, 82 nonhospital facilities reported that they
performed early chemical abortions during 1996, and 114 had
done so in early 1997. The survey was conducted after the
Population Council completed its U.S. trial on 2,121 women
with RU 486/PG; therefore, the chemical abortions would have
been either (1) the small clinical trial of RU 486/PG sponsored
by the Abortion Rights Mobilization (reported in the January-February
1998 The RU 486 Report), (2) clinical trials of MTX/PG
sponsored by Planned Parenthood (reported in the October 1996
and January-February 1998 issues of The RU 486 Report),
or (3) the “legal, `off-label' use of the drug methotrexate
by physicians in their clinical practice,” stated AGI's
press release.
Adjusting for the nonresponse rate of facilities, the authors
estimated that 117 clinics and doctors' practices provided
chemical abortions in 1996, and 163 did so in 1997. Therefore,
in 1997, an estimated 12% of all nonhospital abortion providers
offered chemical abortion. The actual numbers were estimated
to be approximately 4,200 chemical abortions in 1996, and
4,300 in the first half of 1997. Moreover, 44% of current
nonhospital abortion providers indicated that they would probably
provide chemical abortions “within the next 12 months
if mifepristone (RU 486/PG) is approved” by the U.S.
Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Even if it is not approved,
29% of the abortionists indicated that they would offer MTX/PG.
Conclusion
Despite the good news about the decline in abortions and
abortionists, AGI's survey must be taken with a grain of salt.
Their figures always seriously underreport the actual numbers,
especially for states such as California which has no state
abortion-reporting requirement at all.
Moreover, the AGI report offers sobering evidence of the
abortion lobby's grim determination to promote and provide
chemical abortion in the U.S. RU 486/PG has not come on the
U.S. market, but its promoters are still working in that direction.
Judging from the results of AGI's survey about future plans,
the number of abortion facilities using the dangerous MTX/PG
chemical method may have increased significantly during the
two years since AGI collected its data. Local pro-life and
pro-family activists can check by calling local abortion facilities
and asking about chemical abortion.
RU 486 Moves Closer To Market in Germany
Germany is on the verge of being the first country to license
RU 486/PG for abortion in almost eight years. The turning
point was the election last year of Social Democrat Gerhard
Schroeder as Chancellor. In a letter made public on December
17, 1998, “Schroeder said that nothing stood in the
way of RU-486 being sold in Germany,” reported a December
20 Agence France Presse (AFP) story. “If health authorities
gave their approval, the government will be glad to see women
and doctors have a choice between surgery and using the pill,
Schroeder said,” stated the story. The previous government
under Chancellor Helmut Kohl had not requested introduction
of RU 486/PG, but the Social Democrat party traditionally
supported marketing. (See the Sept.-Oct.-Nov. 1998 The
RU 486 Report for background.)
After his announcement, Edouard Sakiz, who currently controls
the patent for RU 486 in Europe, “said he would apply
to European Union Authorities next month for approval to market
the pill in Germany,” reported a December 21 Associated
Press (AP) story.
Schroeder's letter “sparked an angry reaction”
by the chairman of the German Roman Catholic episcopal conference,
Bishop Karl Lehmann, reported the AFP story. The bishop charged
that marketing RU 486/PG “would minimize the seriousness
of deaths of unborn children.” Also “Moral suffering
from use of the pill can be worse than during a surgical abortion,
Lehmann added,” reported AFP.
Archbishop Joachim Meisner of Cologne blamed Schroeder for
allowing “the introduction of an illegal means of killing
unborn children,” stated AFP. The bishop of Berlin,
Georg Sterzinsky, told a radio station “that he was
worried that the chancellor would consider the eventual sale
of a product destined for an act that has never been legally
recognized in Germany,” said the story.
The German minister for women's affairs, Christine Bergmann,
rejected calls for talks with the church about the pill, reported
AP. “I really don't know what there is to talk about,”
she said.
The AFP news accounts asserted that abortions are allowed
in Germany during the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, but are
a sensitive topic because religious officials are present
in many of the counseling centers that issue the certificate
to have an abortion performed.
RU 486 OK'd For New Use
In an unrelated development, the Medicine's Agency of the
French government has approved using RU 486 (trade name “Mifegyne”)
in France for the dilation of the cervix in preparation for
a surgical abortion in the first trimester, reported the November
25, 1998 issue of Scrip, a British drug trade publication.
RU 486 had already been approved in France for chemical abortion
with prostaglandin, for use prior to prostaglandin-induced
abortion, and for inducing labor in cases of fetal death in
utero, said Scrip.
Actions Needed to Stop RU 486 Abortion
There is still a need for Pro-Life and Pro-Family supporters
to take action:
Write the Gedeon Richter company officials in Hungary.
Urge them to stay out of the abortion business. The company
is being sued by the Population Council to compel them to
manufacture RU 486 for sale in the U.S. Address: Lajos Pillich,
Chairman, Gedeon Richter, 19-21 Gyomroi Ut, Budapest H 1103,
Hungary.
Boycott the products of the Hoechst Marion Roussel drug
company. This company and its parent company have controlled
the use of RU 486 worldwide. They claim that they have given
up control, but there is no documentation to support this
claim. Especially boycott the antihistamine Allegra. The
consumer boycott is aimed at pressuring them to withdraw
RU 486 from the market worldwide.
Inform others about the dangers of both the RU 486/Cytotec
prostaglandin ( RU 486/PG) and methotrexate/Cytotec prostaglandin
(MTX/PG) abortion techniques.
Both techniques function in generally the same way to kill
an unborn baby whose heart has started to beat. First, the
RU 486 (or methotrexate) starves the unborn baby to death
by causing the lining of the womb to disintegrate. Second,
another powerful synthetic hormone, the prostaglandin known
as Cytotec (generic name: misoprostol) causes contractions
of the womb which expel the dead baby and the bloody contents.
Some key facts form the “core message” that Pro-Life
and Pro-Family advocates need to keep repeating at every opportunity:
both the RU 486/PG and MTX/PG techniques
– will injure, and possibly kill, women.
– will possibly deform babies who survive the abortion
attempt.
– are being rushed on to the market without regard
for safety by President Clinton to appease the abortion
lobby.
– will increase the number of abortions beyond the
already appalling 1.4 million per year.
– are not “safe” and “easy”
as claimed.
– kill an unborn baby whose heart has started to
beat.
– are not “contraceptive.”
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