Readers Blog: Lower rates in countries where abortion is legal
Repeated international studies have shown that in countries where abortion is legalised there tends to be lower abortion rates than in countries where abortion is illegal or restricted.
An example in practice is Switzerland who has one of the lowest abortion rates in the world, followed closely by Germany, The Netherlands and Belgium.
All these countries allow for abortion unrestricted up to 12 weeks. When Portugal legalised abortion in 2007, legal abortions matched illegal abortion rates initially and then declined over time until finally stabilising.
Similar trends occurred in France, Germany, Spain, Denmark, Finland, Norway and Denmark when legislation was changed.
Some countries where abortion had been previously illegal saw rates increase initially.
However, this spike tends to account for abortions which hadnât previously been included in the data. This is because accurate abortion rates are impossible to collate and measure in countries where abortion is illegal.
There have been some suggestions from the no side that Ireland bucks the international trend and that our current abortion rates can be considered low by European standards. The no side attributes these low abortion rates to the presence of the Eighth.
However, if we examine the research we know that the measurement of accurate data on abortion rates in countries where abortion is illegal is very limited.
Currently Irish abortion rates can only be based on indicators such as data from other countries, pill seizures, surveys, data from benevolent illegal providers and the figures are widely accepted as being underestimated.
Irish women could be having 10,000 abortions a year and we would have no idea. About 7,000 women gave Irish addresses abroad in 2001 so this is not unthinkable, especially since the advent of abortion pills.
What we do know is that if Ireland repeals the Eighth and abortion is legalised up to 12 weeks then it is with almost absolute certainty that abortion rates, and most importantly unsafe abortion rates, in this country will decline.
