Monday, June 3, 2013

Contraception and Abortion,crunching the numbers

Bad Catholic, In a several month series of posts, Crunches the numbers on contraception and abortion and indeed finds a coorelation, though not a causation, between contraception and abortion. And it is NOT the one the family planning people think.

24 comments:

Unknown said...

The article by Bad Catholic discusses the argument as to whether birth control results in an increase or decrease in abortions. It turns out that the results vary depending on what segment of society is being studied.

Intuitively, one would argue that contraception reduces unwanted pregnancies and reduces the corresponding demand for abortions. The counter argument is that it increases the frequency of sex and its failure rate thereby increases unwanted pregnancies resulting in more abortions.

The question is: what is the benefit of having more people fulfilled sexually instead of frustrated at not having sex? I'm being facetious but it is worth consideration.

Theodore M. Seeber said...

My intuition is that contraceptive failure is the #1 cause of abortion in the United States- for it causes both economic abortions where there is real poverty involved, and social abortions where there is the fear of poverty caused by social rejection.

But the part of this article I found interesting was the analysis of reported abortion previous to and after 1960- while it is not causation, that does correlate with the marketing of the birth control pill.

Unknown said...

I don't know how data on abortions were generated when abortion was illegal.

Theodore M. Seeber said...

Leading up to the sudden short-circuit of Roe V. Wade- abortion wasn't illegal everywhere- it was treated as a state's rights issue, and left up to the medical boards of each state what was legal and illegal. Even where it was illegal, partial statistics were kept in the form of criminal records and yes, about 200 murder cases a year (as botched abortions would kill women).

The worst mistake of the pro-choice movement was to win Roe V. Wade and stop the experimentation in the States while not securing conscience protections for doctors.

I am sincerely hoping the pro-life movement, should personhood ever be passed, doesn't make the same mistake. It needs to be on a state by state basis and it needs to include conscience protection for doctors working in triage situations.

Unknown said...

Are you saying that a doctor could refuse to terminate a pregnancy that threatens the mother's life. That wouldn't be good.

Theodore M. Seeber said...

True conscience protection in personhood would require the doctor to practice triage- look at the pregnant woman as TWO patients, mother and child, not just one, and try to save both. When he can't save both- original sin, it isn't just sin, it is also a shortfall in competence- he would have to answer to his conscience which patient he saves.

Sometimes that would be the mother, sometimes that would be the child. But an emergency room doctor NEEDS freedom in his triage decisions without political interference.

This is the same reason that while I'm for personhood, I am *against* heartbeat legislation (which sets the heartbeat as the indicator as to whether or not a fetus is legally alive). There are times when that isn't the hard and fast indicator we would like it to be.

Unknown said...

"Sometimes that would be the mother, sometimes that would be the child."

It should be the mother until she is stabilized then the child. Never the other way around. Kids can always get another sibling. They can't get another mother. And I don't want to hear about making sure the baby gets baptized. That's a crock.

Theodore M. Seeber said...

Even for a mother who is already dead from head trauma but whose body is on life support?

Unknown said...

Of course not. You know what I mean.

Shouldn't you be working? You don't have to answer everything right away.

Theodore M. Seeber said...

Then you agree with me that a doctor *should* be free to decide for himself whose injuries are worse in that situation?

And yes, I should be working.

As I haven't seen any Vietnamese Spam in a few weeks, I am attempting to turn off moderation. Which may also make me miss a few posts.

Unknown said...

"My intuition is that contraceptive failure is the #1 cause of abortion in the United States- for it causes both economic abortions where there is real poverty involved, and social abortions where there is the fear of poverty caused by social rejection."

I understand that without contraception as an option, some (but not all) couples would only have sex when they want children. There could be a false sense of security that could result in the unwanted pregnancy should the contraceptive fail. This happened to me when my partner used a contraceptive foam (or said she did just to trick me into marrying her). So I guess it isn't that far-fetched an argument.

Theodore M. Seeber said...

It is also the group of abortions we stand the best chance of doing something about the cause.



I recently read that even vasectomies stand a 1/100 chance of healing within the first 5 years- a woman training for a marathon thinking she was safe because her husband had a vasectomy was surprised to find that she had been pregnant for 8 months and was in labor to have a premature baby.



There is no such thing as foolproof contraception.



Destroying that myth is something we *CAN* do about abortion. If you can think of anything we can do in the cases of rape and incest that are this simple, you should be broadcasting it.

I am sad about it, but I would agree that the best thing we can do for medical abortion is NOT the heartbeat legislation that has killed so many women in third world countries and in Ireland. The best thing we can do for medical abortion is take the decision out of the hands of the parents and give it to the doctors, who best know their own capabilities to save one or both patients. Triage conscience protection is therefore what I preach back at pro-lifers.

Unknown said...

I could live with a 1 percent chance. How can a vasectomy heal? I guess they do though. The marvels of life finding a way.

Theodore M. Seeber said...

It is still rather gambling if the intent is *no* abortions though, plus of course, you have the case of a couple trying to be abstinent (or practicing NFP) having sex when the woman is fertile and having an unwanted pregnancy with much less frequency than supposedly being assured that it doesn't matter if the woman's cycle is fertile or not and the surprise.

Unknown said...

A couple with the wife not on the pill and with no condoms in the house might take a chance hoping it is not a fertile time of the month. A couple with the wife on the pill or the man using a condemn think that she will not get pregnant no matter what time of the month it is. Without abstinence it is a toss up. I'll go with Couple 2 having the better chance of avoiding pregnancy.

Theodore M. Seeber said...

It's pretty easy to tell the fertile times from the non fertile times if you have a thermometer and a piece of paper to write down the temperature every morning.

At least for the woman however. Problems with the man are harder to diagnose.

Couple 2 is counting on a technological solution that will eventually fail, given enough time.

Couple 1, the only failure is in the interpretation of the data.

More Knowledge is power.

Unknown said...

Couple 2 is enjoying spontaneity and romance. Couple 1 has none of that in taking and recording temperatures and counting days.

Theodore M. Seeber said...

Hmm, that may be part of why I like Abstinence- with the autism I absolutely loath spontaneity. It has *NEVER* been good for me.

Unknown said...

Spontaneity should be a good thing but it isn't always. You've had to deal with your autism. You deserve a lot of credit for what you have accomplished including being a grand knight.

Theodore M. Seeber said...

Hanging that up soon. The Trustees want me to move to 3rd year Trustee and let somebody else run the council. Still have to vote though. Next Monday will be likely my last council.

I think that would be a really good thing for everybody else.

Unknown said...

Sorry to hear that. Our grand knights only serve one year.

Theodore M. Seeber said...

I'm not that sorry- our council covers two parishes, and it is time that I let the other parish have some of the leadership.

Unknown said...

How long have you been Grand Master?

You'll probably enjoy it more not having to run the meetings.

Theodore M. Seeber said...

A year and three months- ever since we got our charter on April 16,2012.

You're right, I think I will prefer to be sitting down....there's actually a rule about that

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Oustside The Asylum by Ted Seeber is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.
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