ABORTION: DID YOU KNOW?

Abortion is illegal in Queensland under Sections 224, 225, 226 and 282 of the Queensland Criminal Code

A first full-term pregnancy decreases a woman's risk of breast cancer(1);

Research shows that between 10%(2) and 87%(3) of women who have had one or more abortions suffer serious psychological trauma;

After fertilisation nothing was "added" to you to enable you to develop into the person you are today; it was just a matter of time and nourishment as, from the moment of conception, you had all of the genetic information you possess now;

Abortion can reduce a woman's ability to have subsequent children due to factors such as ectopic pregnancy(4), spontaneous abortion(5), and pelvic inflammatory disease(6);

Pregnant women are less likely to commit suicide than non-pregnant women(7) whereas the suicide rate following abortion is more than six times the suicide rate for women who gave birth(8)

1. MacMahon et al (1970) Bull WHO 43:209-21
2. Zolese G & C Blacker (1992) "The psychological Complications of Therapeutic Abortion", British Journal of Psychiatry, 160, p 742-749.
3. 1994 UK Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry into the effects of abortion on women
4. Chung et al (1982) "Induced abortion and ectopic pregnancy in subsequent pregnancies", American Journal of Epidemiology, 115, 883-884.
5. Atrash HK & Hogue, CJ (1990), "The Effect of Pregnancy Termination on Future Reproduction", Bailliere's Clinics in Obstetrics and Gynecology, 4, 397
6. Westergaard, L et al (1982), "Significance of cervical chlamydia trachomatis infection in postabortal pelvic inflammatory disease", Obstetrics and Gynecology, 60, 322-325
7. Appleby L (1991), "Suicide during pregnancy and in the first post-natal year", British Medical Journal, 302, 137-140;
8. Gissler M et al (1996), "Suicide after pregnancy in Finland 1987-94: register linkage study",
British Medical Journal, 313, 1431-1434