Abortion's first victim is the unborn child. Mothers are also victims, physically, psychologically and socially. Others in society are also harmed indirectly by the acceptance and practice of violence as a response to what is usually a social problem.

Abortion's first victim

The purpose of abortion is to end the life of the unborn child. These are the techniques used:

'Medical' Abortion
The term "medical abortion" is used to refer to abortions by chemical rather than surgical means. There are several techniques used.

The Abortion Pill (RU486, also known as Mifepristone or Mifegyne)
This drug attacks the womb lining, the baby’s source of nourishment and physical protection. It does this by interfering with the hormone needed to maintain the womb lining. It is used early in pregnancy, up to 9 weeks, and in mid to late pregnancy, from 12 weeks onwards, and is accompanied by prostaglandin. On its own RU486 is only about 80 per cent effective as a complete abortion. At least three clinic visits are made for a medical abortion: one for the RU486 tablets, another two days later for the prostaglandin and a third 8-12 days afterwards to check whether the abortion is complete. A few women may bleed and have a complete abortion at home between hospital visits.

The prostaglandin can be given by pessary, drip, catheter or injection. The drug causes the womb to contract and expels the baby. The woman must stay in hospital for at least 4-6 hours after the prostaglandin is given to be monitored while the baby is being expelled from the womb. In mid to late pregnancy (12 weeks onwards) multiple doses of prostaglandin may be required because of the size of the baby and the abortion will take longer. However, in all cases the woman is usually able to go home the same day.

Surgical Abortions

Vacuum Aspiration
This is the most commonly used surgical technique in developed countries. It is most commonly used between 7 and 15 weeks of pregnancy although can also be used between 4 and 7 weeks. The cervix (neck of the womb) is dilated (made bigger) and a tube connected to a suction pump is inserted into the womb. The suction pump creates a vacuum, which dismembers the baby and removes him/her from the womb. The remains of the baby are checked to see whether the womb has been emptied and the abortion is complete.

Dilation and Evacuation (D & E)
D & E: This method uses a combination of suction, curettage and specialised forceps. The baby is dismembered and removed together with the afterbirth. D & E is used between 15-24 weeks as well as in late abortions for disability. However, medical abortion is more commonly used in mid to late pregnancy.

Abortion’s second victim – the expectant mother

Physical Complications after abortion
In Britain abortion has been practiced as a legal procedure for 35 years, it is therefore a relatively “safe” procedure with few physical complications. However there are risks associated with the different types of procedures; the most common are haemorrhage, infection, perforation of the uterus and damage to the cervix.The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (RCOG) warn that there is a 10% risk of post-abortion infection (Evidence-Based Clinical Guideline Number 7 The Care of Women Requesting Induced Abortion, RCOG, Sept 2004).

Serious or untreated post-abortion infection can lead to infertility and problems such as endometriosis or scarring of the fallopian tubes. Most abortion providers now therefore offer screening and/or antibiotics to women seeking abortion. Serious untreated infection or damage to the uterus or cervix could lead to problems with future child-bearing.

A common cause of post-abortion pelvic infection is the sexually transmitted disease chlamydia. Chlamydia is increasingly common in women and infects the neck of the womb. It is often symptomless, so women may not know they have it. A surgical abortion will carry the infection into the womb where the tissue and blood left behind by the abortion provide the perfect environment for the organism to grow and spread infection to the fallopian tubes.

Research shows that 10-40% of women having abortions have a chlamydia infection and out of these women 10-25% will develop post-abortion pelvic infection (Skjeldestad F. E., Induced abortion: chlamydia trachomatis and postabortal complications. A cost benefit analysis, Acta Obstetrica et Gynaecologica Scandinavica, 67(6):525-9, 1988. Duthie S.J. et al., ‘Morbidity after termination of pregnancy in first trimester’, Genitourinary Medicine, 63:182-7, 1987). In other words, between 1% and 10% of all women having an abortion will be affected in this way. According to the British Medical Journal, pelvic inflammatory disease carries a 17% chance of tubal infertility, a 20% chance of chronic pelvic pain, a 40% chance of deep dyspareunia (painful intercourse) and an 80% chance of menstrual disturbance. There is also a sevenfold increase in the risk of ectopic pregnancy (Pearce J.M., Pelvic Inflammatory Disease, British Medical Journal, 300: 1090-1, 1990).

The most recent research also indicates a risk of future pre-term delivery due to the damage that may be caused to the cervix during abortion (Thorp Jr. et al, “Long-term Physical and Psychological Health Consequences of Induced Abortion: Review of the Evidence”, Ostetrical & Gynaecological Survey 2003, 58[1]).

Breast Cancer
In spite of the widespread practice of legal abortion over the past two decades in most Western countries, certain serious side effects remain unacknowledged by the abortion industry. Increasing evidence points to a link between abortion and breast cancer, especially if the woman aborts her first pregnancy. Breast cancer is one of the major causes of early death in women.

The most recent research indicates that although induced abortion does not directly increase the risk of breast cancer it does result in a reduced protection against breast cancer and therefore the net result is an increased risk (Thorp Jr. et al, “Long-term Physical and Psychological Health Consequences of Induced Abortion: Review of the Evidence”, Ostetrical & Gynaecological Survey 2003, 58[1]).

Published studies have also found:

• First trimester abortion of first pregnancy led to increased risk of breast cancer of 140% among women under 32 (Pike M.C. et al., Oral contraceptive use and early abortion as risk factors for breast cancer in young women, Brit. J. Cancer, 43: 72-76, 1981).
• Risk of breast cancer increased after abortion of a first pregnancy by 43%, after two or more abortions before first full term pregnancy by 73%, and after one induced abortion with no live births, by 285% (Ewertz and Duffy, Risk of breast cancer in relation to reproductive factors in Denmark, Brit J. Cancer, 58:99-104, 1998).
• Among women who developed cancer while pregnant those who carried pregnancy to term had a 20% survival rate, those who miscarried received aggressive treatment and had a 42% survival rate, but every single woman who chose abortion died (Clark R.M. and Chua T., Breast cancer and pregnancy: the ultimate challenge, Clin Oncol, Royal Coll. Radiol. 1:11-18, 1989).
• Among women who had been pregnant at least once, the risk of breast cancer in those who had experienced an abortion was 50% higher than among other women. Those at greatest risk had abortions before they were 18 (Daling J.R. et al, Risk of Breast Cancer Among Young Women: Relationship to Induced Abortion, J. Nat. Cancer Inst., 86/21: 1584-1592, 1994).

Abortion has now become so widespread in Britain that, if these studies are correct, it now accounts for around 600 new cases of breast cancer in women under 50 each year, more that 10% of the total in that age group.
For example, figures for 1990 show a total of 5,606 new cases among women aged 20-49 (OPCS Monitor MB1 95/1, 26 July 95). Assuming that 25% of women have an abortion at some point in their childbearing years, then if abortion increases the likelihood of breast cancer by the age of 50 by 50% (which is consistent with the finding of Dr Janet Daling’s recent study) one would expect that out of 5606 cases; 1869 would be women who had had abortions, 623 of whom would not have contracted the disease had they not had an abortion.

Psychological Complications after abortion
The evidence that abortion can damage the mental health of women has been accumulating.

A British study, published in 1992, found that about 10% of women having an abortion will suffer marked, severe or persistent psychological or psychiatric disturbances (Zolese & Blacker, The Psychological Complications of Therapeutic Abortion, British Journal of Psychiatry, 160: 742-9, 1992).

The 1980s witnessed an increasing interest of mental health professionals in the possibility of identifying symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder, which could be linked to abortion. The phenomenon of Post-Abortion Trauma (PAT) has been increasingly discussed within professional organisations and in professional journals and studies.

These include:
De Carvalho E., & Monteiro A., Rematrixing an experience with abortion, Journal of Group Psychotherapy, Psychodrama and Sociometry, 43: 19-26, 1990
De Verber L. et al., Post abortion grief; psychological sequelae of induced abortion, Humane Medicine, 7: 203-9, 1991
Steinberg T., Abortion Counselling To Benefit Maternal Health, American Journal of Law and Medicine, 15: 483-517, 1987
Barnard C., The Long Term Psychological Effect of Abortion, Portsmouth, New Hampshire, Institute for Abortion Recovery and Research, 1990
A number of books have also examined the accumulating evidence. These include:
Doherty P., Ed, Post-Abortion Syndrome, Four Courts Press Ltd, Dublin 1995
Selby T. and Bockmon M., The Mourning After; Help for Post- abortion Syndrome, Baker Book House, Grand Rapids 1990
Reardon D., Aborted Women; Silent No More Loyola University Press, Chicago, 1987
Speckhard A., The Psycho-Social Aspects of Stress Following Abortion, Sheed and Ward, Kansas City 1987

Post-Abortion Trauma is the grief, guilt and anger associated with the loss of a child through the mother’s abortion decision.

The RU486/chemical abortion is particularly traumatic for the woman because of her direct involvement in the procedure and the result of having to live through her abortion over a number of days.

Despite the number of letters printed in the press and women’s magazines from women telling their trauma and suffering after an abortion, the subject of Post-Abortion Trauma is still controversial. Some mental health experts and their professional associations even deny that it exists. This is partly because most of the major health organisations of the western world have allied themselves to the pro-abortion cause. They are therefore professionally committed to minimising the possible ill effects of the procedure which must be kept at a level that would seem to be ‘worth the risk’, given the supposed ‘advantages’ of abortion.

Denial
Pro-abortion campaigners and many sections of the media have been unwilling to give credence to the growing volume of evidence that women have suffered serious harm to their mental health as a result of abortion. This is because, as the authors of a study in the Journal of Social Work and Human Sexuality pointed out in 1985, they fear that any admission of the negative consequences of abortion will provide ammunition to pro-life campaigners. (Lodi, McGettigan and Bucy, Women’s response to abortion: implications for post-abortion support groups, Journal of Soc. Work & Human Sexuality, 3: 119-32, 1985)

Pro-abortionists frequently deny the existence of Post-Abortion Trauma. As well as the Birth Control Trust, Professor Wendy Savage, at the pro-abortion “Forum” in Guernsey, 13 July 1995, said there was no such thing as post abortion syndrome.

Denial of the damage inflicted by an abortion, or the connection between an abortion and the symptoms a woman may experience, is a recognised trait of Post-Abortion Trauma. Those who promote abortion seem to have the same traits: perhaps they genuinely fail to see the devastation abortion causes in the lives of so many women. Those who make public policy must not be allowed to ignore the injustice that abortion inflicts on the unborn child or to deny the damage to the lives and welfare of mothers – abortion’s other victim.

(An information pack on Post-Abortion Trauma can be obtained from British Victims of Abortion, 75 Bothwell Street, Glasgow, G2 6TS, Telephone 0141 226 5407.)

SPUC Scotland Paper 3
The Case Against Abortion
Revised June 2004

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