Recession spurs increase in abortions

AN increasing number of couples are choosing to have an abortion because of financial worries, according to a crisis pregnancy counselling service.

PACT, an advice service funded by the Crisis Pregnancy Agency (CPA), said women and couples struggling financially were increasingly under pressure to consider their options when a crisis pregnancy occurred.

Berit Andersen, a counsellor with PACT, said before the recession there was always a sense of being somehow able to cope, but now that was not the case. “These are couples who may already have two or three children and the cost of another is simply not manageable,” she said. “We are increasingly seeing women who say: ‘I never thought I’d see myself here’.”