Pros and Cons of Abortion

By Jamimma Sarekukka
 Abortion can be defined as pregnancy termination accidentally
as in a miscarriage or by choice. In the modern world, abortions
have become a norm of life. It is considered to be one of the easiest
and convenient ways of getting rid of unwanted and accidental
pregnancies. Though women have been endowed with the gift of
bearing a life form, an abortion gives them the option whether they
want to avail the present or not.
However, an abortion should not be misunderstood for a
convenience, as it does have its own advantages and
disadvantages. As these might be subjective, any woman should
consider the following pros and cons before deciding the fate of the
unborn child. Hereby we would be weighing the pros and cons of
abortion and discussing whether the availability of abortion is an
important right for women to have.
Abortions caused by rape, incest and possible health concerns
to mother/baby constitute just 7%. Social and personal issues are
the cause for rest of the abortions.
PROS OF ABORTION:

• Many a times, abortion helps to safeguard women's health. There

are many women, who suffer from various hazardous medical
conditions such as heart disease, kidney disease, severe
hypertension, sickle-cell anemia, severe diabetes, etc. As these
diseases can be life-threatening, an abortion often helps to avoid
serious medical complications from childbirth. But abortion should
be carried out after proper medical advice as it can lead to potential
miscarriages in the future.

• In male chauvinistic societies, women are considered nothing more

than child bearing machines. Therefore, a right to abortion gives her
an individual identity, as per which she can decide the fate of her
child.

• At times, abortion also helps in keeping a check on the size of the

family. It can serve as a potent tool to undo mistakes, thereby
preventing mothers to be forced for raising a child at a young age.
PROS OF ABORTION:

• The convenience of abortion provides the parents with an option of having a

wanted child. In its absence, any unwanted pregnancy would lead to the
birth of many children, who weren't wanted. This could immensely hamper
the social strata of the society, having negative implications especially on
child's psyche.

• Moreover, in cases where women are raped, getting pregnant with such a
child is yet another brutality they would be forced to bear. Thus, the option
of abortion is the best for them.

• Though women have a hard time choosing abortion as an option for

unwanted pregnancies, they have been making the choice for a long time.

• Ultimately, she is the one who would be going through the actual "Labor" of
continuing pregnancy, delivering a baby, bringing it up, parenting it well, in
addition to other obligations she has to do in her daily life. To get it done
with little or no help from the partner and families needs a well-balanced
body and mind.
PROS OF ABORTION:

• There is nothing called pro-choice and pro life. Both ideologies meet at one
common point i.e. Pro-Life - Life of the baby and Life of the mother. Life of
the baby ultimately depends on mother’s health and it's best to allow the
mother to choose for her, WHEN she wants a baby.

• While we argue about the mental well being of a woman, how do others get
to decide what would be more traumatic to the woman, abortion or;
'childbirth and the unending list of duties waiting to be accomplished'.

• An attempt to restrict the abortions would rise not only the percentage of
illegal and unsafe abortions but also the expenses of the procedure. A new
law would be needed to tackle the illegal abortions and further legal hassles
would have no ends.

• Nearly all abortions take place in the first trimester, when a fetus cannot
exist independent of the mother. As it is attached by the placenta and
umbilical cord, its health is dependent on her health, and cannot be
regarded as a separate entity as it cannot exist outside her womb.
PROS OF ABORTION:

• The concept of personhood is different from the concept of human life.

Human life occurs at conception, but fertilized eggs used for in vitro
fertilization are also human lives and those not implanted are routinely
thrown away. Is this murder, and if not, then how is abortion murder?

• Adoption is not an alternative to abortion, because it remains the woman's

choice whether or not to give her child up for adoption. Statistics show that
very few women who give birth choose to give up their babies - less than
3% of white unmarried women and less than 2% of black unmarried women.

• Abortion is a safe medical procedure. The vast majority of women - 88% -

who have an abortion do so in their first trimester. Medical abortions have
less than 0.5% risk of serious complications and do not affect a woman's
health or future ability to become pregnant or give birth.

• In the case of rape or incest, forcing a woman made pregnant by this violent
act would cause further psychological harm to the victim. Often a woman is
too afraid to speak up or is unaware she is pregnant, thus the morning after
pill is ineffective in these situations.
PROS OF ABORTION:

• Abortion is not used as a form of contraception. Pregnancy can occur even

with responsible contraceptive use. Only 8% of women who have abortions
do not use any form of birth control, and that is due more to individual
carelessness than to the availability of abortion.

• The ability of a woman to have control of her body is critical to civil rights.
Take away her reproductive choice and you step onto a slippery slope. If the
government can force a woman to continue a pregnancy, what about forcing
a woman to use contraception or undergo sterilization?

• Taxpayer dollars are used to enable poor women to access the same
medical services as rich women, and abortion is one of these services.
Funding abortion is no different from funding a war in the Mideast. For those
who are opposed, the place to express outrage is in the voting booth.

• Teenagers who become mothers have grim prospects for the future. They
are much more likely to leave of school; receive inadequate prenatal care;
rely on public assistance to raise a child; develop health problems; or end
up divorced.
CONS OF ABORTION:

• An abortion can be considered a brutality as it does not give the child in the
womb, a chance at life. In effect, it is highly condemned by a lot of religions
as well. It is a form of murder and demeans the value of human life. When
a pregnant women feels a kick in her belly, she doesn't say "Oh, the fetus
kicked" or "Oh, the mass of cells that hasn't become a person kicked", she
says "The baby kicked." Yes, after conception you have a real human being
waiting to enter the world. Why should taking someone's life when they're in
the womb be any different than taking their life when they're a baby in the
crib? Pro-choice advocates claim this isn't a real baby only to justify their
wrong acts in their own minds. Even if you don't believe abortion is murder,
it still demeans the value of human life, since women can so callously stomp
out a living being simply because they're inconvenienced.

• Abortion is often used as a type of birth control by many women. This in a

way promotes infidelity, wherein women can easily have many sexual
relationships, which would eventually end up in abortions. Other birth control
is readily available; thus, abortion shouldn't be a form of birth control. There
are dozens of birth control methods that can keep you from becoming
pregnant, including the 100 percent effective one: abstinence. Maybe if
abortion wasn't available, people wouldn't be so careless in the first place.
CONS OF ABORTION:

• Abortion also promotes an irresponsible behavior amongst people,

as they do not want to take responsibility of their own actions. It
gives them the freedom of committing careless activities and then
getting rid of them easily. The societal contributions of a potentially
valuable human being are wiped out. What would the world be like if
the mothers of Abe Lincoln, George Washington, or Thomas Edison
had had an abortion? Just maybe a woman has become pregnant
despite all birth control attempts because the child is destined to do
something great.

• Abortion can lead to many medical complications such as infection,

sepsis, recurrent miscarriages, etc. Abortion exposes women to
various health risks and the danger of losing fertility. Abortion
exposes woman to a number of health risks including, but not
limited to, infection, sterility, and in rare cases, death. A number of
short-term symptoms such as bleeding, fever, nausea, and vomiting
are also common.
CONS OF ABORTION:

• Abortion can also cause psychological impairments amongst women

such as depression and guilt. Women who have abortions often
suffer major psychological damage from the experience along with,
in some cases, the father of the child. Many women who have
abortion in their younger years end up living the rest of their lives in
perpetual guilt. Even if that women doesn't consider it murder at the
time, that may change as she matures. Even Jane Roe (not her real
name), the original woman behind the famous court decision, has
completely changed her mind on abortion. She filed a petition to
have the decision overturned to help relieve the guilt of hundreds of
thousands of needless deaths she blames on herself. Also, let's not
forget that there are two parents of every aborted child. The father
may feel just as guilty. The father may even want the child, but he
has no choice if the mother chooses abortion.

• The important con that should be considered is can we choose to kill

unwanted pregnancies? One shouldn’t be so irresponsible to land up
in a situation where they have to be unmerciful to the unborn.
CONS OF ABORTION:

• For women who demand complete control of their body, control

should include preventing the risk of unwanted pregnancy through
the responsible use of contraception or, if that is not possible,
through abstinence.

• Choosing adoption as an alternative to abortion would give the baby

its right to life. There are many couples who spend years on waiting
lists trying to adopt a child. The number of couples out there who
cannot have a child of their own for physical reasons are too
numerous to count. The waiting list for adopting babies can be 5-10
years or more. Young women in their teens are right to be
concerned that they're not ready to effectively raise a child.
However, if that is the case, there are plenty of wonderful people out
there who are. Not only would you be bringing a valuable life into
the world, you'd also be making the dream of a childless couple
come true.
CONS OF ABORTION:

• The abortion decision is often made by minors or young adults, who

don't have the maturity and life experiences to make good decisions.
There's a good reason why we don't allow people to drink alcohol,
smoke, or drive until they're a certain age. It's because they haven't
matured enough to make good, sound decisions. We've all made
bad decisions in our younger years that provide us with life
experience to make sounder judgment in the future. The one skill
that seems to take the longest time to develop is the ability to
consider the feelings and needs of someone besides ourselves. Why
should such a life or death decision as abortion be made by a person
who probably hasn't developed that capacity?

• People have the right not to see their tax dollars go to something
they find immoral. Abortion is a medical procedure that must be
performed by a doctor. The government contributes to many health
care institutions such as Healthcare for the Homeless, Planned
Parenthood, free clinics, etc. All of us who pay taxes have the right
to prevent that money from going to something we consider murder.
CONS OF ABORTION:

• Abortion eliminates legal rights of the unborn child. The documents

of our founding fathers state that we are all entitled to life, liberty,
and the pursuit of happiness. By legalizing abortion, we take those
rights away from a future American citizen. Just because the babies
can't speak for themselves doesn't mean they have no rights. If a 1-
month old is murdered, it that really different than abortion as far as
protecting an American's life? If a person shoots and kills a pregnant
woman, shouldn't the punishment be more severe? If you legalize
abortion, it would tell the courts there is no difference.

• Abortion is against doctors' Hippocratic Oath. Every American

doctor must take this fundamental oath, which says "First, do no
harm". It threatens the very fabric of the entire medical field if
doctors start using their own personal philosophies on life to decide
who should or shouldn't be harmed. Whether or not you think
abortion should be allowed, it cannot be disputed that a doctor is
harming a living organism. Killing a human being doesn't serve any
higher medical purpose and is therefore a violation of the oath.
SOURCE:

1. “Pros and Cons of Abortion” By Dr.Maizie M, 2010 Buzzle.com

http://www.buzzle.com/articles/pros-and-cons-of-abortion.html

2. Teen Pregnancy - The Pros and Cons Of Abortion By Mark

Huttenlocker, 2010 EzineArticles.com http://ezinearticles.com/?
Teen-Pregnancy---The-Pros-and-Cons-Of-Abortion&id=665523

3. Should Abortion Be Banned (Except in Special Circumstances

Like Saving the Mother's Life)? Written by: Joe Messerli, 05/04/10
http://www.balancedpolitics.org/abortion.htm

4. Ten Arguments For Abortion and Against Abortion, Abortion Pros

and Cons, and Main Points of the Debate By Linda Lowen, 2010
About.com Guide
http://womensissues.about.com/od/reproductiverights/a/AbortionA
rgumen.htm