Prometheus 6

 The issue of abortion has always had a peculiar resonance with me. With African American women undergoing over 300,000 abortion per year for the last decade or so, I have been fasinated as to why this is such in light of the ready availibility of contraception, notwithing Norplant and related products.

For me, the implications of this "method of contraception" carried out to such an extent raise several questions as to why:

1.Is the number so excessive because there are so many clinics located in and around the Black community so that by shear presence alone leads women to this choice of contraception for lifestyle purposes?

2. Is it because Black women lack faith in oral, barrier contraception, etc?

3. Is it because Black women don't have access to safe and reliable contraception?

4. Is it because some Black have such marginalized lives from a social and economic perspective that it fustrates their desire to carry a pregancy to full term? 

5. Being that Blacks are overwhelmingly socially conservative, why the disconnect in the matter of abortion outside of rape or saving the life of the mother? (Blacks overwhelmingly approve of these circumstances as morally acceptable  reasons for abortions.)

6. ????????????????????????????????????????

Finally, what will the political implications be for the Black community in 10 years, for example, when you look at the abortion rate in Hispanics which number around 145,000 as of 2001 combined with ~800,000 live births, compared to ~550,000 live births per year in Blacks compared to  over 300,000 abortions. The math is interesting. Moreover, I have observed data that suggest a birth dearth, (that is, not meeting replacement number 2.1) in Black women/men with the economic wherewithall to truly have a family. So we are in a natal /population dilemna. What will these numbers mean ten years from now, for example, when doling out political favorites and resources?

Has a new level of selfishness swept into our community and has inserted itself so far into our cultural grain so as to jeopardized our very being?

Holla back at me!

GDAWG 

GDAWG, can you tell me the source of the number you use?

That would be easier than making me find it myself...

You will find the abortion data at MMWR journal on the CDC's website. In fact the abortion data for 2002 is out and the numbers still holld up. The Live births data are also found there. 

GDAWG

Got it. Interesting:

Results: A total of 854,122 legal induced abortions were reported to CDC for 2002 from 49 reporting areas, representing a 0.1% increase from the 853,485 legal induced abortions reported by the same 49 reporting areas for 2001. The abortion ratio, defined as the number of abortions per 1,000 live births, was 246 in 2002, the same as reported for 2001. The abortion rate was 16 per 1,000 women aged 15--44 years for 2002, the same as for 2001. For the same 48 reporting areas, the abortion rate remained relatively constant during 1997--2002.

The highest percentages of reported abortions were for women who were unmarried (82%), white (55%), and aged <25 years (51%). Of all abortions for which gestational age was reported, 60% were performed at <8 weeks' gestation and 88% at <13 weeks. From 1992 (when detailed data regarding early abortions were first collected) through 2002, steady increases have occurred in the percentage of abortions performed at <6 weeks' gestation. A limited number of abortions was obtained at >15 weeks' gestation, including 4.1% at 16--20 weeks and 1.4% at >21 weeks. A total of 35 reporting areas submitted data stating that they performed and enumerated medical (nonsurgical) procedures, accounting for 5.2% of all known reported procedures from the 45 areas with adequate reporting on type of procedure.

Interpretation: During 1990--1997, the number of legal induced abortions gradually declined. When the same 48 reporting areas were compared, the number of abortions decreased during 1996--2001, then slightly increased in 2002. In 2000 and 2001, even with one additional reporting state, the number of abortions declined slightly, with a minimal increase in 2002.

Public Health Action: Abortion surveillance in the United States continues to provide the data necessary for examining trends in numbers and characteristics of women who obtain legal induced abortions and to increase understanding of this pregnancy outcome. Policymakers and program planners use these data to improve the health and well-being of women and infants. 

I also ran across the 2003 birth statistics while looking around.

The teenage birth rate fell 3 percent in 2003 to 41.6 births per 1,000 women aged 15–19 years, another record low for the Nation. The rate has plummeted by one-third since the 1991 peak (61.8). The rate for females aged 10–14 years declined to 0.6 per 1,000, a one-third decline since 2000. Birth rates for teenagers 15–17 and 18–19 years each fell 3 percent. The rate for ages 15–17 years was 22.4 per 1,000, 42 percent lower than in 1991, and the rate for ages 18–19 years was 70.7 per 1,000, 25 percent lower than in 1991. Declines in rates have been especially striking for black teenagers: their overall rate dropped 45 percent since 1991, whereas the rate for young black females 15–17 years has plunged more than half. Rate declines for all teenagers were substantial enough to more than compensate for the increased number of female teenagers, so that the number of births to women under 20 years dropped to the fewest since 1946, the first year of the baby boom.

Looks like all that librul sex education was working.

Yep.

What's interesting about the abortion data is that white women are 35% of the population but undergo 55% of abortions, whereas Black women are 6% of the population but have undergone 36% of abortions for the last few year. Something here seems to me rather gross and distorted. Also birth rates are fine, but I like the raw data to compare with actual mortality, abortions,and  population figures directly. I get a better feel of the disproportionality this way. Unless you examine it that way, at least for me, you don't get the true impact of the data and what it truly represents.