By NRLC Communication Department

Earlier today, the Guttmacher Institute (formerly a special research affiliate of Planned Parenthood) released its latest report on national abortion numbers. For 2008, the annual number of abortions remains virtually unchanged from 2005--at just over 1.2 million. Even though the numbers are far below their peak of 1.6 million in 1990, no matter which way you look at it, the numbers remain staggering.

As can be expected, Guttmacher concluded that a vast majority of these abortions are performed in urban centers – a fact that was grimly underscored in a press conference held last week in New York City.

In December 2009, the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene reported that 41% of all pregnancies in the five boroughs of New York ended in abortion – a percentage that has been unchanged for each of the last three years. (By comparison, the Guttmacher report found that in 2008, the national abortion ratio was right at 22%.) A total of 87,273 abortions were performed in New York in 2009, or roughly 7% of the overall national total. (If it weren't for the hard evidence provided by the city, the sheer numbers would almost seem unbelievable.

While four boroughs reported abortion ratios hovering around 38% and 39%, the ratio was highest in the Bronx with 48% of all pregnancies ending in abortion. And when broken out by ethnicity, the data show almost 60% of pregnancies in New York's African-American community ending in abortion. (In other words there were three abortions for every two live births.)

These numbers aren't about “women's rights.” They're about a complete and total breakdown of society. And sadly, they're not an recent development.

New York City Department of Health data provided by the recently-formed Chiaroscuro Foundation, which sponsored the press conference, show an abortion ratio for the city hovering in the mid-40% range as far back as 1994. All told, nearly one million children have been aborted in New York in the past decade.

"For the first time in my happy twenty-one months as a New Yorker, I am embarrassed to be a member of a cherished community I now – usually with a lot of pride – call home," said New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan in his remarks before the press. "That 41% of New York babies are aborted – a percentage even higher in the Bronx, and among our African-American babies in the womb – is downright chilling."

For the religious, civic and political leaders assembled at New York's Penn Club last week, the numbers were a call to action to do better for the mothers of New York City and their unborn children.

In leading the charge to do better, Dolan remarked that "[a] quarter century ago, Cardinal John O'Connor publicly stated:

"Any woman who is pregnant and in need can come to the Church and we will help you," a pledge Cardinal Egan, and now I, reaffirm."

The story is beyond sad and tragic. But you probably haven't read about this anywhere, right, and especially not the commitment by both the Archdiocese of New York City and the Chiaroscuro Foundation to help women with crisis pregnancies? With the exception of National Review Online and National Right to Life News Today, neither did we. Why?

Simple: a 41% abortion ratio isn't abortion for only the rarest and hardest of circumstances. A 41% abortion ratio is abortion as a method of birth control – an ugly truth that the abortion industry would rather not highlight as they continue to make their case to make abortion a basic "health care" right because they know the public isn't on their side.

Polling consistently continues to show a majority of Americans opposed to abortion for any reason. The most recent poll conducted by the Polling Company for National Right to Life found 53% were opposed to the vast majority of abortions performed in the United States (10% opposed abortion in all circumstances, 11% opposed abortion except to save the life of the mother, and 32% opposed abortion except in cases of rape, incest or to save the life of the mother).

What's the moral of the story: we can't stop doing what we're doing. State laws that protect mothers and their unborn children are needed now more than ever to provide medically accurate information about the abortion procedure and the development and pain of the unborn child and to inform mothers about the life-affirming alternatives available.

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