Must Reading for Pro-Lifers

Women's Health after Abortion: The Medical and Psychological Evidence is a brand new book published by the non-profit deVeber Institute for Social Research. Unfamiliar to Americans, this Canadian "think tank" has been open for business since 1982. The institute specializes in first-rate analyses of a number of topics, including euthanasia and assisted suicide.

Twenty-nine years and counting into the reign of Roe v. Wade--is there anything new that can be added/debated? Well, yes - - actually, lots and lots.

And I don't just mean the newer enemy objects on the radar screen--such as human cloning, and embryonic stem cell research that would require the destruction of human embryos. There is also the multi-pronged offensive taking place on friendlier terrain.

Most of this reinvigorated debate gets its impetus from the fact that the unborn passenger, once shrouded in darkness, is now increasingly visible. This greater recognition is, in turn, reflected in, for example, the warm reception "Unborn Victims of Violence" laws are receiving, bills which recognize there are two victims when a pregnant woman is assaulted and her child injured or killed.

But there is another dimension to the ever-complicated abortion debate. Issues which have been buried for years and years are starting to surface (or, in some instances, resurface). This welcome change just takes time, patience, and the willingness to look at many studies whose primary emphasis often is not abortion.

The thrust of Elizabeth Ring-Cassidy's and Ian Gentles's Women's Health after Abortion: The Medical and Psychological Evidence is a truth that pro-lifers know both intuitively and by personal experience: "safe, legal abortion" is not only lethal to the unborn child but the killing also exacts a toll on women far more serious than the public is led to believe. But is there evidence to back up this gut feeling?

Indeed. This excellent book mines a deep vein of research--over 500 articles that have appeared in medical and other journals, for the most part during the past 20 years--to demonstrate that abortion has serious and long-term consequences for women. The problem of getting this information gathered and communicated to the public is two-fold.

As mentioned, typically the primary research is on another topic. There's almost an "oh-by-the-way" quality. In looking at something else, researchers discover that abortion really does hurt women. (An aside: it also is not uncommon for researchers to misread their data in order to reach the "correct" conclusion.)

The other complicating factor is that there is a fundamental disconnect. Complications, such as infertility, may not show up for years and years, not until the woman decides she wishes to have a baby. But abortion follow-up in most cases is for but a few days or, at best, a few months.

So when a woman says she has had no "abortion aftermath," this may well seem true to her. But were she asked years later, a whole different picture might emerge.

In addition, with virtually all abortions now being performed in outpatient clinics (as opposed to hospitals or even a private physician's office), studying the fallout from abortion is now far more difficult. Follow-up in clinics ranges from minimal to none. "Nonetheless," as the book concludes, "what research there is, shows that abortion is the source of serious physical and psychological problems for a significant number of women."

One of the many accomplishments of this new book is to bring together in one place the conclusions of many studies that, standing alone, do not convey the risks that abortion poses to women. The deVeber Institute encapsulates the book's thesis thusly: "Abortion complications are seriously underreported, leaving women who undergo abortion largely unaware of the range of physical and psychological risks they face."

By comprehensively reviewing the world medical literature, Women's Health after Abortion: The Medical and Psychological Evidence raises many red flags. For instance, we learn, "Breast cancer, pelvic infection, infertility, life-threatening ectopic pregnancy, and subsequent premature births - - with higher rates of children born with cerebral palsy - - were found to be associated with abortion. Abortion complications were not limited to physical health. While abortion is often regarded as a cure for the depression and stress of a crisis pregnancy, the study found that women are more likely to commit suicide after abortion than after giving birth to a child."

Taken in the context of over 1.3 million abortions annually in the United States and another 114,000 in Canada, suddenly the reader is introduced to the magnitude of this potential public health issue. Elizabeth Fox-Genovese, Emory University professor of humanities and women's studies, calls the findings "compelling." She concludes that the study "makes overwhelmingly clear [that] women who seek abortions in the United States and Canada are not even told of the risks they are running."

Indeed, as Gentles, history professor at York University in Toronto, asks, "In the absence of this knowledge, how can a woman give her informed consent to an abortion?"

So, what are the key risks abortion poses to a woman's health and fertility?

After an extensive review of the world medical literature, the book's contributors show that abortion is associated with:

Suicide

A woman's risk of suicide is up to six times higher after abortion than after giving birth to a child, according to three large worldwide studies.

Gissler M et al. Suicides after pregnancy in Finland 1987-94: register linkage study. British Medical Journal 1996 Dec. 7; 313(7070):1431-4.

Breast cancer

27 worldwide studies, including 13 U.S. studies, show the risk caused by the unprotected internal estrogen exposure a woman receives after an abortion. A young woman who aborts her first pregnancy nearly doubles her lifetime risk of developing breast cancer.

Daling JR et al. Risk of breast cancer among young women: relationship to induced abortion. Journal of the National Cancer Institute 1994 Nov(2);86(21):1584-92.

Immediate complications

Pain, bleeding, infection, perforated uterus, and occasional death occur at rates higher than usually reported. True rates are often underestimated by inadequate hospital diagnostic coding.

Heisterberg L, Kringelbach M. Early complications after induced first-trimester abortion. Acta Obstetricia et Gynecologica Scandinavica 1987;66(3):201-4.

Infertility, prematurity, neonatal cerebral palsy

Subsequent infertility, life-threatening ectopic pregnancy, and premature delivery of subsequent children, which increases the risk of cerebral palsy 38 times in the earliest premature babies.

Escobar GJ et al. Outcome among surviving very low birthweight infants: a meta-analysis. Archives of Disease in Childhood 1991;66:204-211.

Such eye-opening results fill the pages of Women's Health after Abortion: The Medical and Psychological Evidence.

Don't be put off by the fact that book comes out of a think tank. It's written in plain English with helpful periodic summaries which make the work extremely reader-friendly.

To secure your copy, contact Bambi Rutledge at the deVeber Institute for Bioethics and Social Research. The phone number is (416) 256-0555. The institute's web page is located at www.deveber.org, and its e-mail address is bioethics@deveber.org.

dave andrusko can be reached at dha1245@juno.com