Saturday, October 29, 2005

Abortion related depression questioned.

Anti-Choice proponents claim that women who terminate pregnancies are more likely to become depressed.

As reported in an Article on the BBC News Website - A recent study by British Medial Journal researchers indicate there is no credible evidence of any link to higher risks of depression.
They looked at 1247 women who either terminated and unwanted pregnancy or kept it to term and in fact found that the ones who terminated tended to be less depressed. They also found that those that tended to opt for pregnancy termination were more educated and affluent than those who decided to bring the unwanted pregnancy to term.


"This suggests that if the goal is to reduce women's risk of depression,
research should focus on how to prevent and ameliorate the effect of unwanted
childbearing, particularly for younger women,"
said the researchers.

Sophie Corlett, of the mental health charity Mind, said:
"While any distressing life event has the potential to affect an individual
person's mental health, this study supports earlier research that abortion, as
opposed to bringing to term an unwanted pregnancy, does not increase the risk of
later depression.


A spokeswoman from the British Pregnancy Advisory Service, which provides abortions to women in Britain, said:
"From our experience, abortion does not cause depression, as long as a woman has
discussed all her options and made a fully informed decision."
"Very few women return for post-abortion counselling and this is because they made the best decision for them at the time and see no need to talk to a counsellor."

Please read the entire BBC Article, there are opposing views from the anti-choice lobby and the lobby-of-people-who-want-to-force-their-religious-beliefs-upon-everyone-else. Example Link 1, Example link 2, Example link 3.

3 Comments:

At 2:34 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Just because not all women are depressed by abortion does not mean that no woman is!!! You cannot make blanket statements either way; each woman is different.

I am okay with abortion being legal up to a max of 9 or 10 weeks of pregnancy, so I am not completely anti-abortion. However, I learned the hard way that abortion is at best a tragic, necessary evil that can have huge emotional and psychological repercussions.

I had an abortion almost a year ago at 13 weeks of pregnancy (it should be illegal at that stage), and I am still very traumatized by it. I've been severely depressed for months, at times suicidal. Many days, I barely even got out of bed. I missed out on thousands of dollars in lost wages because I was unable to work because of depression. I would gladly have an arm or leg amputated if it meant I could have my baby back. So, don't tell me no woman suffers depression over having an abortion.

I am educated and relatively affluent. But one reason more educated, affluent women are more likely to choose abortion is because there is much more of a social stigma--and therefore less social support--for having a baby out of wedlock. Unmarried educated women are also more likely to have a career that requires a lot of overtime--and most daycare centers are only open until 6 pm. So, women in a higher socioeconomic group may be aborting in large part because of pressure from others and work demands, rather than because it is what they really want.

And the counselors at the clinic where I had the abortion were terrible. They did not explore any resources that might have made it easier to have my baby or ask me any in-depth questions. There should be a lot more in-depth counseling and a lot more social and financial resources to help women make the choice to have the baby.

And for the record, I am not religious at all; I'm an agnostic. So, I don't feel guilty because of religious beliefs. It's just that the knowledge that I had my baby chopped into pieces and vacuumed out of me gets me down.

 
At 5:44 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I don't buy your story, anonymous.

 
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