Abortion's Lingering Damage Revealed
Studies indicate a substantial percentage of women experience serious post abortion complications
by Dr. Barry De Veber,
Institute for Bioethics and Social Research in Toronto
Originally published as an Op-Ed in the London Free Press

After reviewing the various letters to the editor supporting abortion on demand and Henry Morgentaler, I would like to make a few comments and corrections.

Pro-life supporters come from various moral and religious backgrounds, but they all want to see the unborn child or fetus given some recognition and status so it cannot be eliminated simply because it's not wanted.

They see a small, defenceless human individual, which at seven weeks has a heart beat and brain activity, and by 14 weeks is fully developed. By 20 to 24 weeks these babies become viable, as in rare cases they can survive outside the womb. About this time, before birth, they can have intrauterine surgery on the heart and other organs, at which point they become patients. Of course, they have no legal status until a miraculous passage through the birth canal, when it is recognized by everyone as a legal human being.

However, since abortion supporters choose to ignore these facts, they should be concerned about complications following abortions that are increasingly reported in scientific literature: 1) A study sponsored by the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario, in 2001 showed that 41,000 women who had abortions had five times the number of hospital admissions for psychiatric problems, compared to a similar number of women who had no abortion. This was a short-term study done at three months, and did not deal with long-term effects of abortion. 2) A study published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal in 2003 showed an increase number of psychiatric admissions among lower-income women who had induced abortions. 3) A Finnish study of the records of 600,000 women showed a six-fold increase in suicides in post-abortion women compared to those with a live birth, three times the incidence of women in general. There are other published studies in Britain and the U.S. showing similar findings. 4) It is obvious there are large numbers of women with post-abortion psychological problems, judging by the growth of hundreds of related counselling centres in North America, the largest being Project Rachel.

The rest: http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2005/jul/05071204.html