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U.S. abortion rate plunged during 1990s, report says
©Associated Press NEW YORK -- The U.S. abortion rate dropped significantly during the second half of the 1990s, particularly among teenagers, and experts attribute the decline to better awareness of contraception and a fear of disease that has cut down on sexual activity. The rate fell 11 percent between 1994 and 2000, from about 24 abortions for every 1,000 women of childbearing age to 21, the nonprofit Alan Guttmacher Institute reported Tuesday. The rate among girls ages 15 to 17 declined a dramatic 39 percent, from 24 abortions per 1,000 girls to 15. At the same time, researchers were surprised by a sharp increase in abortions among poorer women, or those who earn less than twice the federal poverty level of about $17,000 for a family of four. "Their abortion rates were increasing while they were going down for everyone else," said Rachel K. Jones, who led the study. "The increase in abortion rates among economically disadvantaged women was not expected," Jones said. Jones and her colleagues -- who eventually aim to analyze contraceptive use and failure rates among women who have abortions -- surveyed more than 10,000 women obtaining abortions at 100 clinics in 2000-2001, then compared the results to surveys from 1994 and 1987. The survey showed that while the abortion rate declined, abortions remained disproportionately concentrated among never-married women, particularly African-Americans and Hispanics. The low-income and poor women surveyed had high abortion rates partly because they had high pregnancy rates -- thus, they had more abortions "and more births than higher-income women," Jones said. Still, the increase in abortion rates among disadvantaged women was an "abrupt change" from the 1987-1994 period, when their rates declined, the researchers wrote in their study, published in the journal Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health. Sarah Brown, director of the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy, noted that the drop in abortions among teenagers was accompanied by a decline in teen sex, teen pregnancies and teen births during the late 1990s. "This signals a deep and profound and robust change in adolescent sexual behavior in this country," she said. Analysts have credited a broad set of factors for those trends, including fear of AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases and more open discussion with youngsters about sex. Researchers said more funding for teen pregnancy prevention programs has probably improved awareness and access to contraceptives. Similarly, they said that less money for family planning programs for poor women could be one factor for the increase in their abortion rate. For women below the poverty line, the abortion rate rose 25 percent. It climbed 23 percent among women making less than twice that level. The Guttmacher institute receives some funding from Planned Parenthood, but its abortion statistics are generally regarded by both antiabortion groups and abortion-rights supporters as accurate. -- Information from Knight Ridder Newspapers was used in this report.
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