Are Irish women really less honest than their counterparts in the UK?

It has been said recently that to exclude the threat of suicide as grounds for a legal abortion would be to wrongly cast aspersions on both women and doctors as it would suggest that they would dishonestly claim that a threat of suicide exists in order to obtain an abortion.

Unfortunately, evidence from the UK suggests that widespread dishonesty would be an inherent feature of the introduction of abortion on these grounds.

In 2011 there were 723,913 live births in the UK and 196,082 abortions were performed. 21% of all viable pregnancies ended in an abortion.

According to statistics compiled by the House of Commons Library, 95% of these abortions were performed under the section of the Abortion Act 1967 which allows a termination on the grounds of “risk of injury …… to the mental health of the woman”.

So, in other words, virtually all abortions carried out in the UK are on the grounds that the mother has claimed that the pregnancy has led to suicidal thoughts.

You don’t have to be a psychiatrist, an obstetrician or even a mathematicianto know that it is simply not possible that a fifth of all pregnant women suddenly want to end their own lives, so clearly thereis widespread dishonesty on the part of both women and their doctors in using this section of the UK legislation to obtain an abortion.

If women in the UK are conspiring with doctors to abuse the law on such a massive scale, then would it really be that unfair to conclude that Irish women will do likewise?

I very much doubt that Irish women are any more or less honest than women in the UK.

Barry Walsh

Clontarf

Dublin 3