The abortion rate in the United States has fallen to its lowest level since 1974, the first full year after Roe v Wade, the case by which the U.S. Supreme Court usurped all state laws regarding the practice.Well, Chicago Tribune reporter Judy Peres reports on this new data in a poorly written and biased story in which she manages to attribute this drop not to changed attitudes towards abortion, not to the burgeoning number of pregnancy aid services made available by government and private pro-life agencies, and not to the ever-increasing ingestion of contraceptive and abortifacient drugs (though that is finally given a brief mention in the conclusion of the article).
No, what Peres somehow concludes is that the drop is due to: 1) "a sharp decline in the number of abortion providers" and 2) that "states have enacted hundreds of laws requiring mandatory waiting periods, parental consent for minors, ultrasound imaging of the fetus and numerous other regulations."
That's right...hundreds of laws. Wow.
But this wild exaggeration isn't merely a sloppy error; Peres' article is clearly designed to promote more sex education, more contraceptives, more abortionists (especially in rural areas), and less regulation of any kind on the abortion industry. It is an example of "advocacy journalism," just the kind of thing the MSM prefers over thorough and fair reporting.
For my take on the Guttmacher findings themselves, my comments from a Vital Signs Blog post of June 2006 post remain relevant. That post was in response to the news of the latest drop in Nebraska's abortion rate and, among a few other things, I wrote:
...The obvious question arising from these statistics concerns the dramatic decline and I've got a couple of thoughts about that. On one hand, there is certainly positive evidence that the prayers and educational efforts of pro-life advocates over the years have paid off in amazing ways. There is in Nebraska and throughout the country a greater tenderness towards prenatal life because of our work. I am encouraged.
However, the Nebraska decline in surgical abortions also involves things that are not so encouraging. Among these is the opening of a Planned Parenthood abortion center in Council Bluffs, Iowa (just across the river from Omaha) which is clearly drawing some of C.J. Labenz's and Leroy Carhart's abortion business. And less liable to demographic charting are the increases in chemical and internal device abortions being performed in Nebraska (Norplant, the "morning after pill," RU-486, the patch, the I.U.D., and the most deadly of all in sheer numbers, the abortions caused by the backup mechanisms of the so-called birth control pills when breakthrough ovulation occurs). The kids killed by these "secret" abortions won't show up on any state report but their deaths are as tragic and unnecessary as those done by any curette or suction machine.
So yes, I believe pro-life Nebraskans can take heart from the latest reports from the state but they must not relax their efforts. No, we must not only keep up what we've been doing but we must also increase our prayers and our creative efforts against whatever sources of endangerment lie in wait for mothers and their babies.
