New Oklahoma law will publicy post details of women’s abortions online.

I want to start off by saying this is so F***ing Wrong!!!

By Amanda Terkel

http://thinkprogress.org/

On Nov. 1, a law in Oklahoma will go into effect that will collect personal details about every single abortion performed in the state and post them on a public website. Implementing the measure will “cost $281,285 the first year and $256,285 each subsequent year.” Here are the first eight questions that women will have to reveal:

1. Date of abortion
2. County in which abortion performed
3. Age of mother
4. Marital status of mother
(married, divorced, separated, widowed, or never married)
5. Race of mother
6. Years of education of mother
(specify highest year completed)
7. State or foreign country of residence of mother
8. Total number of previous pregnancies of the mother
Live Births
Miscarriages
Induced Abortions

Although the questionnaire does not ask for name, address, or “any information specifically identifying the patient,” as Feminists for Choice points out, these eight questions could easily be used to identify a woman in a small community. “They’re really just trying to frighten women out of having abortions,” Keri Parks, director of external affairs at Planned Parenthood of Central Oklahoma, said. The Center for Reproductive Rights is challenging the law, arguing that “it violates the Oklahoma Constitution because it ‘covers more than one subject’ — a challenge that previously worked to strike down an abortion ultrasound law.”

China Performs 13 Million Abortions Yearly

By AP

(BEIJING) — China performs about 13 million abortions every year, mostly for single young women who experts say know little about contraception, state media said Thursday in a rare disclosure of sensitive family planning statistics.

The China Daily newspaper said the real number of abortions is believed to be even higher since the 13 million accounts for procedures in hospitals but many more are known to be carried out in unregistered rural clinics. Also, about 10 million abortion pills are sold every year in China, the paper said. (Read "China's One-Child Policy")

It quoted Wu Shangchun, a government official with the National Population and Family Planning Commission, as saying that nearly half of the women seeking abortions in China had used no form of contraception.

China imposed strict birth controls in the 1970s, limiting most couples to just one child. Sterilization and the use of intrauterine devices, or IUDs, for women are widely promoted — and subsidized — forms of contraception for married women. However, the policy tends to overlook the contraception needs of unmarried women even as attitudes toward casual sex have dramatically liberalized. (See TIME's China covers.)

The report said around 62 percent of the women undergoing abortions were single and aged between 20 and 29 years old.

It called the widespread use of abortions "an unfortunate situation" but did not directly say whether abortions were on the rise. No year to year statistics were given.

Wu told the paper that reducing the number of abortions was a tough challenge facing the country.

Peking University professor, Li Ying, was quoted as saying that sex education needed to be improved at the university level and that Chinese parents also needed to teach their kids more about sex.

The government says its family planning controls since the 1970s — including contraception, sterilization and abortion procedures — have prevented an additional 400 million births in the world's most populous country of 1.3 billion.

About 1.2 million women have abortions each year in the United States, which has a population of just more than 300 million people.

See TIME's Pictures of the Week.

First the Affair, Then Paternity Test, Then Abortion?

Concerns Grow in the U.K. That the Rise in Prenatal Paternity Tests Leads to Abortions

By AMMU KANNAMPILLY

LONDON, Jan. 27, 2009 —

The illegal use of DNA testing to determine the sex of foetuses in the developing world is widely...

The illegal use of DNA testing to determine the sex of foetuses in the developing world is widely known, but now, concern is growing in the UK that the availability of prenatal paternity tests is encouraging women to terminate foetuses which are the result of extramarital affairs.

(ABC News Photo Illustration)

The illegal use of DNA testing to determine the sex of fetuses in the developing world is widely known, but now, concern is growing in the United Kingdom that the availability of prenatal paternity tests is encouraging women to terminate fetuses that are the result of extramarital affairs.

According to Dan Leigh, the marketing director with DNA Solutions, a global DNA test firm with offices in 40 countries, the number of women opting for the prenatal paternity test shot up from 20 in 2002 to 500 last year.

"The testing technology has improved vastly," Leigh told ABC News. "It's become much more accessible."

"It's fairly common to see women take this test after their husbands have found out about an affair and want to know if they have fathered the child their wife is carrying," Leigh said.

"But 75 percent of the cases involve women coming in of their own volition; they want to know whose child they are carrying," he said.

As for the concerns over women terminating their pregnancies as a result of the tests, Leigh demurred, saying that "there are no statistics to support that, but it [abortion] happens when the husband turns out not to be the biological father."

"It's a sad situation," he said. "It often ends either in divorce or the husband insists on terminating the pregnancy."

The company encourages women who apply to take the prenatal paternity test to also see a therapist. But, although 90 percent of the company's U.S. customers consult with a therapist, only 20 percent of its U.K. clients do, because "the idea of seeing a counselor is just not popular in this country," Leigh said.

And, despite criticism from anti-abortion rights organizations, Leigh insisted that DNA Solutions does "not encourage abortion or termination of pregnancies."

"We are offering the chance to clarify the truth," he said.

"Frankly," he said, "the risk to a baby from an amniocentesis is a much bigger concern for us, and we are working on being able to conduct the test using a blood sample from the mother's arm instead, find a noninvasive way of doing it."

Anti-abortion rights campaigners like Josephine Quintavalle, director of Comment on Reproductive Ethics, dismiss such concerns, saying that, "unless you are conducting a test to help a baby -- for health reasons, say -- there is no significant reason to carry out any procedure that might hurt a baby."

"I don't think we should condone any form of testing that might lead to either sex selection or termination of the fetus," she said.

But the boom in prenatal paternity testing may be a mirage, according to other DNA testing organizations.

Mark Pursglove, the international operations manager for the U.K.-based International Biosciences, said that his company performed "about one or two tests a month" and that the paternity tests were not necessarily tied to adultery.

"Last year," he said, "two of the cases we dealt with involved rape victims who wanted to find out if they were carrying the rapist's babies."

The supposed popularity of these tests has been overstated, he said.

"The process costs between £800-£900 [$1,133-$1,274]," he said. In contrast, DNA Solutions offers tests beginning at $332.

Pursglove said that "the clinics we use for the test won't take up a case if they believe that a termination might be the result."

Furthermore, all clients must "speak to a gynecologist, an obstetrician or a general practitioner before the test is carried out."

Although the company forbids any "gender inquiries about the fetus," unless the person or couple involved explicitly discusses the possibility of termination, the company goes ahead with the test, Pursglove said.

But the expectation of total honesty from a woman caught in such a sensitive situation may just be too high, according to some.

And many anti-abortion rights campaigners believe the chances are slim that anyone would undergo a risky test costing hundreds of dollars without any intention to terminate the pregnancy in case the test turns up a disturbing result.

As this testing technology becomes more sophisticated and more accessible, however, it's likely that paternity tests will only become more commonplace, even as the battle to hammer out an ethical stance on the matter shows no signs of letting up.

Copyright © 2009 ABC News Internet Ventures

Repeat abortions among teenage girls have risen by 70%

By Fiona Macrae

A third of terminations are carried out on women who have had at least one before

The number of abortions performed on teenage girls who have had at least one before has risen by almost 70 per cent since 1991, fuelling fears that terminations are being carried out for lifestyle reasons.

Experts yesterday warned that binge drinking among teenagers had also contributed to the increase.

In 2007, 5,897 girls under 20 had their second, third or even fourth termination.

Sixteen years earlier, in 1991, the figure stood at just 2,934, the journal Contraception reported.

The analysis by scientists at Nottingham University, found that - even taking into account the rise in abortion among all age groups - the proportion of repeat terminations carried out on teenagers rose by 68 per cent in 16 years.

Abortions in the UK have reached record levels - almost 200,000 a year in England and Wales - a rate second only in the western world to the U.S. Researcher Jacqueline Collier, a professor of health services research, said that although there were probably many reasons behind the 'radical increase' in repeat abortions in teenagers, it is likely that alcohol played a part.

Calling for more research into the issue, she said: 'It is right for us to put it as a priority. It is not good for society, let alone for teenagers, to be having repeat terminations or repeat pregnancies they are not wanting or not able to continue with.'

When all age groups are included in the analysis, a third of terminations are carried out on women who have had at least one before.

The evidence shows that some women have had eight or more.

Thirteen girls aged under 18 were on at least their fourth abortion in 2007, the Department of Health figures showed.

Dr Trevor Stammers, a GP and a lecturer in healthcare ethics, said: 'I think that young women who have had one abortion fall into two camps.

'There is one that understands the ongoing consequences and another that (is) very cavalier and hardened about it and have entered a phase of regarding it as a backup method of contraception.

'We have got to communicate that abstinence is not folly.'

Norman Wells of Family and Youth Concern, which campaigns against family breakdown, said we were living in a 'contraceptive culture'.

He added: 'High abortion rates and the alarming number of repeat teenage abortions are the inevitable fruit of a society that has made an idol of sexual pleasure and failed to respect its proper place and purpose.'

But Ann Furedi of the British Pregnancy Advisory Service, which carries out almost a third of UK abortions, said: 'A lot has changed the past two decades.

'Abortion has become more acceptable, easier to access for all age groups, better funded by the NHS, and more integrated into mainstream healthcare - all of which are good things.'

She added: 'Everyone agrees that it would be better for young people to avoid unwanted pregnancies and there is an extensive range of research and ongoing practical initiatives to address this.

'All of these moves contribute to young people feeling more able to make choices about whether or not they should have sex and how best to handle the consequences.'

McCain Uses Air Quotes To Mock Concerns For Mother's Health

The differences of opinion surrounding the issue of access to safe and legal abortion, and a woman's right to choose to have one, have long been a mainstay of political debate. But tonight, I believe, featured a historical moment in that debate, because until tonight, I had never seen the matter of a woman's health given AIR SCARE QUOTES. But that's precisely what John McCain did, sneeringly, as he attempted to portray support for a mother's health as an extreme position, when in fact, it is a mainstream position -- ground that even fervent pro-life individuals often concede.

Reached for comment, Megan Carpentier of womens' issues blog Jezebel had this to say:

It used to be that McCain was leading the charge to reform the Republican platform to include exceptions for the life and health of the mother to their anti-abortion plank. That tonight he declared his own position extreme -- let alone called a woman that chooses her own continued existence over the potential future life of a fetus "extreme" -- is a pretty significant and rather disgusting charge.

I concur, absolutely and without reservation.

[WATCH.]

UPDATE:

Cecile Richards, the president of the Planned Parenthood Action Fund, weighs in:

"Tonight, John McCain showed he doesn't care about women's health when he described protecting "the health of the woman" as "extreme." John McCain doesn't seem to understand that women's health matters. He blatantly showed that he doesn't trust women to decide what is in the best interest of their own health. Barack Obama, on the other hand, stood up for women's health."