Abortion Rates Up Under Bush

When "President" Bush was appointed president in 2000, the nation's abortion rates were at a 24-year low. Under his leadership, the decade-long trend of declining abortion rates appears to have reversed. 52,000 more abortions occurred in the U.S. in 2002 than would have been expected.

Why?

1. Two thirds of women who have abortions cite "inablility to afford a child" as their primary reason.

2. Half of all women who choose abortion say they do not have a reliable mate.

3. Women often do not have health care for themselves and their children. This factor increases the number of abortions.

The Bush administration has presided over an abyssmal loss of jobs. Average real incomes have decreased. The minimum wage has not been increased for 7 years. Costs of everything are increasing. Prospective mothers fear another mouth to feed.

Men who are jobless usually do not marry. As male unemployment increases, marriages fall and abortion rises. Single moms often hold down two jobs just to survive. Does this not lead to an increase in abortion rates? With a decrease in after school programs, these moms face stress, knowing their kids are going home to empty houses every day. Can we stand in judgement that they cannot cope with another child to care for?

With poor or no health care available to them, women and their children suffer more untreated illness. Women of childbearing age are overrepresented in the 5.2 million with no health insurance. Abortion rates increase in this group. Many of these women may likely have already experienced high risk pregnancies and may not dare to risk another.

Without health care, insurance, jobs, child care, and a living wage, Bush rhetoric is hollow. In Bush's world, women are damned no matter how you look at it.

[Read the Houston Chronicle article in full by clicking on the blog title above.]