AU: The terminators: using abortion as a form of contraception

SARAH BERRY
26 Jun, 2012

Grace* 31, was 18 when she had her first abortion. Since then, she has had five.

To many, this figure is shocking, but she is not alone in having aborted multiple foetuses.

The Daily Mail recently reported that Britain's National Health Service is spending around £1 million a week on repeat abortions. The paper revealed that the latest figures show some 189,000 abortions took place in the UK in 2010. Of these, more than 64,000 terminations were on women who had already had at least one abortion.

"Abortion is an unpleasant and harrowing experience for women and to hear it is happening repeatedly makes your hair stand on end," Josephine Quintavalle, of the UK's Pro-Life Alliance, told the Daily Mail. "These figures show that sadly, abortion is being seen by many as a form of contraception."

The figures for abortion in Australia are unclear, partly because abortion and miscarriage are given the same medicare number. However, in 2006 there were an estimated 71,773. the rest