Not a supporter of mandatory counselling, but I don’t think that any of this adds up to the title’s claim that most women “don’t need” it. That’s quite a vague statement that basically comes down to how you define your criteria.

Unity,

“The claim that honest, non-directive, pre-abortion counselling will lead to a significant reduction in the number of abortions carried out is the UK is a complete and utter fabrication.”

How much of 189,000 a year would you consider to be significant number?

Kojak:

Dorries and her cronies claim that so-called ‘independent counselling’ would result in a 30% cut in the number of abortions.

The Guttmacher stidy shows that only 2% of women change their mind following counselling and that close to 9 out of every 10 women who present for an abortion have already firmly made up their mind before their counselling session.

The bottom line here is that while women should be offered the option of counselling if they want it, the vast majority do not have a clinical need for counselling.

Yup – nothing like a fabrication attempting to debunk another fabrication.

But sure, keep on going trying to twist every study that comes out such that it gives you “cast iron” proof of what you already believed in the first place anyway.

Confirmation bias, anyone?

James:

What we have here is a study of more than 5,000 women who voluntarily undertook non-directive pre-abortion counselling, of which only 2% changed their mind about having an abortion, with another 5% not undertaking the procedure for other reasons.

The study is clearly written and details its limitations but nevertheless provides us with primary data to work with.

The claim that introducing so-called ‘independent’ counselling will result in a 30% fall in abortions is based on the assumption that the abortion rate would fall to levels similar to those in Germany, irrespective of any cross-cultural differences, differences in abortion laws and differences in age standardised conception rates.

In short, there is no evidence to support such a claim.

Congratulations, you may have learned the words ‘confirmation bias’ but you clearly have a long way to go before you grasp their meaning, let alone the meaning of ‘evidence’, ‘research’, ‘data’ and ‘ad hominem’.

Do feel free to come back when you actually have an argument to put forward.

Of course they don’t need counselling. That is not the purpose. It is to intimidate, the woman into giving birth to please the pro birth fetishists.

I wonder what Dorries’ reaction would be to a suggestion that all pregnant women should be required to attend counselling on the risks of pregnancy and guidance on whether they should want to give birth or have an abortion – not just the ones that want an abortion, but all the rest too?

Sally re comment 6:

Sally,

As we all know – you are way beyond counselling.

A new study has been published by the Guttmacher Institute which sheds some interesting light on women’s needs and choices at the point at which they make contact with abortion service providers.

Guttmacher Institute? From Wikipedia:

“The Guttmacher Institute is a non-profit organization which works to advance reproductive health including abortion rights. …. The Guttmacher Institute in 1968 was founded as the “Center for Family Planning Program Development”, a semi-autonomous division of The Planned Parenthood Federation of America.”

Sure. No problems with bias there. What are you going to do next? Quote the Pope on the need for such counselling?

The study, ‘Attitudes and Decision Making Among Women seeking abortions at one US clinic‘ shows, unsurprisingly, that the vast majority of women have very firmly made up their mind about having an abortion before making contact with an abortion clinic:

That may be true but it has nothing to do with the claims being made. Someone who has made up their mind can still be traumatised by it. Someone who has made up their mind may not be aware of the alternatives.

Although only a single centre study, the paper is based on data extracted from the pre-assessment and clinical intake forms of more than 5,000 women who voluntarily took up the clinic’s offer of counselling of which only 7% did not to go ahead with the abortion for reasons we’ll come to shortly.

Abortionists offer counselling, most women don’t change their mind about the abortion. Hardly ground breaking research is it?

So overall the picture we have here is one of a readily identifiable subgroup of women for whom pre-abortion counselling is likely to prove beneficial at the decision-making stage and hence a need for screening at the initial assessment stage but not for actual counselling.

Sorry but which readily identifiable sub-group would this be? The ones already determined to have an abortion or the many many sub-groups of people who may have problems with the decision?

The study also flatly contradicts claims made by Nadine Dorries and her supporters that the introduction of so-called ‘independent’ abortion counselling would lead to 30% decrease in the number of abortions carried out in the UK.

No it does not. It does not even remotely come close to doing that. On the contrary, it finds that people who are determined to have an abortion and have a pro-abortion support network don’t need counselling. But people with limited education, few options, and religious problems have a lot of issues. They may well need counselling and that counselling may well make them change their minds. The fact that pro-abortionists think otherwise in research they themselves have done is irrelevant.

The claim that honest, non-directive, pre-abortion counselling will lead to a significant reduction in the number of abortions carried out is the UK is a complete and utter fabrication.

It may be. But there is not one little shred of evidence here that would even suggest it is so.

SMFS:

I get it… You are Wendy Wright and I claim my commemorative replica Home Ergaster jawbone.

10. Unity

I get it… You are Wendy Wright and I claim my commemorative replica Home Ergaster jawbone.

Mildly amusing but not really a response is it? Especially when you say things like this:

3. Unity
Kojak:

Dorries and her cronies claim that so-called ‘independent counselling’ would result in a 30% cut in the number of abortions.

The Guttmacher stidy shows that only 2% of women change their mind following counselling and that close to 9 out of every 10 women who present for an abortion have already firmly made up their mind before their counselling session.

The bottom line here is that while women should be offered the option of counselling if they want it, the vast majority do not have a clinical need for counselling.

What is so …. what is a polite way of saying verging on dishonest? about this is that the Guttermacher Institute is dedicated to producing research to further the abortion agenda. That is their purpose. Of course if they offer counselling to people seeking an abortion, it is not going to be not to get an abortion. It will be to encourage them to do so. That is their whole purpose. Firmly making up your mind is not the same as could do with some counselling.

As long as you continue to ignore the massive bias in this research it is utterly and totally worthless to respond. But by all means, please feel free to make another content-free reply.

SMFS:

It’s very easy to shout ‘bias’ but then in the natural and social sciences we have this thing called ‘evidence’ that we require to back up such allegations so if you have any specific methodological issues with the study you want to discuss, allowing for the fact that paper includes a discussion of its limitations, then I’m game, otherwise you really have nothing to add in relation to this study.

Someone who has made up their mind can still be traumatised by it. Someone who has made up their mind may not be aware of the alternatives.

Leavign aside the fact that the claim that women are traumatised by abortion is, at best, extremely dubious and largely unsupported by credible evidence – the PTSD model that anti-abortion activists are trying to promote really doesn’t fit the evidence at all well – the percentage of women who chose not to have an abortion, following counselling, is consistent with the percentage of women that David Fergusson’s 2009 follow-up study on abortion and mental health identified as exhibting significant levels of post-abortion distress, putting them at a higher risk of developing subsequent mental health problems.

That’s two separate studies, one from the US and one from New Zealand, giving very similar figures for the percentage of women who exhibit high degrees of ambivalence when considering a decision of whether or not to have an abortion.

In short, we have signs of a pattern – and this also answers your question about which subgroup of women I’m referrring to.

As for being aware of alternatives, if we’re going to insist on making women aware of the alternatives (like they’re too dumb not to know that adoption is an alternative) then we should also give them an honest and accurate appraisal of the short and long-term risks of psychiatric sequelae in women who have given up babies for adoption. While ‘adoption trauma’ is questionable, separation trauma in women who’ve given up children for adoption is a very real phenomenon. albeit one that the adoption sector ignores completely. You won’t find any adoption providers in the UK that provide clear information the mental health risk associated with giving a child up for adoption.

They may well need counselling and that counselling may well make them change their minds.

“Make’ them change theiir minds? You have some very odd idea about the purpose of counselling, not to mention a very patronising attitude towards some women – and never mind that in the UK being poorly educated and having limited options correlates positively with women choose to carry an unwanted pregnancy to term rather than have an abortion.

If you calculate the ratio of abortions to live births amongst teenagers for local authorities areas in England and Wales you’ll quickly find that teenagers living in the most affluent areas are around twice as likely to have an abortion than teenagers in the most deprived areas. From memory, the correlation between social advantage and the abortion to live birth ratio for England and Wales is around 0.65-0.68.

What the data for teenagers shows in its the well educated, well-informed. middle classes who are much more likely to head straight for an abortion clinic if they unexpectedly fall pregnant that the poor, ignorant and deprived teenagers, who are much more likely to carry a pregnancy to term.

12. Unity

It’s very easy to shout ‘bias’ but then in the natural and social sciences we have this thing called ‘evidence’ that we require to back up such allegations so if you have any specific methodological issues with the study you want to discuss, allowing for the fact that paper includes a discussion of its limitations, then I’m game, otherwise you really have nothing to add in relation to this study.

It is very easy, but no we do not. This is an advocacy organisation set up to provide data to support the expansion of abortion. We do not need evidence the study is biased because the source is compromised. Just as we do not need evidence that the Pope is, you know, Catholic.

Leavign aside the fact that the claim that women are traumatised by abortion is, at best, extremely dubious and largely unsupported by credible evidence – the PTSD model that anti-abortion activists are trying to promote really doesn’t fit the evidence at all well

Even if you reject that model, and I am perfectly happy to, there is no denying the large body of evidence that some women have abortions are regret it later on. A long time afterwards in fact in some cases.

the percentage of women who chose not to have an abortion, following counselling, is consistent with the percentage of women that David Fergusson’s 2009 follow-up study on abortion and mental health identified as exhibting significant levels of post-abortion distress, putting them at a higher risk of developing subsequent mental health problems.

I am still not happy with this unified approach to “counselling”. To have any credibility you would have to look at what sort of counselling is being provided and who is providing it. Until you do that, I don’t see what is the point of making any comparison. Counselling is not all the same. Nor do I see what point you’re making here – that women who change their minds after counselling would have otherwise gone on to have an abortion and then suffer distress?

That’s two separate studies, one from the US and one from New Zealand, giving very similar figures for the percentage of women who exhibit high degrees of ambivalence when considering a decision of whether or not to have an abortion.

Which is outrageously suspicious in and of itself. New Zealand not being like the US in many respects. Given the US population contains a lot of poorly educated young Black women having abortions and I am assuming the New Zealand comparison does not, how can any valid comparison be made?

In short, we have signs of a pattern – and this also answers your question about which subgroup of women I’m referrring to.

No it doesn’t really. In America they are more likely to be poorly educated and Black. The same group in New Zealand? I think not.

As for being aware of alternatives, if we’re going to insist on making women aware of the alternatives (like they’re too dumb not to know that adoption is an alternative) then we should also give them an honest and accurate appraisal of the short and long-term risks of psychiatric sequelae in women who have given up babies for adoption.

By all means. The more information the better.

“Make’ them change theiir minds? You have some very odd idea about the purpose of counselling, not to mention a very patronising attitude towards some women

If you want to quibble over semantics, by all means, do so. The purpose? That is one of my points – Planned Parenthood is going to have a very different sets of purposes to Dorries’ favoured providers. You can’t claim they are all the same.

What the data for teenagers shows in its the well educated, well-informed. middle classes who are much more likely to head straight for an abortion clinic if they unexpectedly fall pregnant that the poor, ignorant and deprived teenagers, who are much more likely to carry a pregnancy to term.

Yeah but that does not mean that more middle class children are having sex. You are comparing groups that have already become pregnant. American Blacks manage to have more abortions and more teenage mothers than Whites because they are engaging in more unsafe sex earlier. Being Middle Class is highly correlated with delaying sexual activity.

I would like to see a comparison of the number of abortions in the UK during the years immediately after legalisation with the number of abortions carried out now. Could somebody help?

It would be interesting to see how this has grown and understand why.

[14] huge jump in the first 4-5yrs post abortion act and a gradual increase since then http://users.aber.ac.uk/jrl/abstat.htm

@a&ecn #15:

huge jump in the first 4-5yrs post abortion act and a gradual increase since then http://users.aber.ac.uk/jrl/abstat.htm

…although it’s not clear how much of that initial jump was genuinely an increase in the total number of abortions, and how much was a result of transfer from illegal to legal abortions.

I find abortion very distasteful. Yet I can see that it can be – indeed, is often – the lesser of two evils. That said, I simply cannot see why the state has a role in this matter. Subject to minimal regulation – probably including mandatory pre-abortion counselling – abortion should be available on demand (at a small charge).

[16] the difference is fourfold (roughly 40,000 to 160,000) – that would amount to a lot of back street activity?

@a&ecn #18:

the difference is fourfold (roughly 40,000 to 160,000) – that would amount to a lot of back street activity?

Why do you think it was legalised?

Comments 15 to 19 thank you.

If the number of abortions carried out has risen fourfold from legalisation to now is it not right to conclude they are being carried out for reasons which would have not been regarded appropriate when legalisation took place?

The arguments in favour of abortion (unwanted pregnancy by rape victims, severe disability etc) are as valid now as when abortion was legalised however they cannot account for the massive increase in numbers.

Would the Abortion Act have been passed if it’s advocates thought it was mainly about lifestyle choices and contraception or even about selection of gender?

As a person who was adopted pre 1967 I have an opinion which runs counter to the glib wisdom of Laurie Penny (little vigilante):

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/may/20/abortion-advert-outcry?commentpage=all#start-of-comments

littlevigilante
20 May 2010 1:17PM
‘If a woman can’t face the scan how does she face a lifetime of complicity in her child’s death? ‘

A fetus isn’t a child, it’s a ball of cells that might one day become a child. And most abortions take place in the early stages of pregnancy, when an embryo is too small to even show up on a scan.

For most women, abortion is a relief, not a lifetime of complicity – women who have abortions are not criminals.Your sententious moral misogynyis sickening.

Robin:

Actually, the explanation for the rapid early rise in abortion is to be found in the official birth statistics which include data – believe it or not – on the number of birth occuring within 8 months of marriage.

The trend in such births, in the first 5-6 years after abortion was legalised, mirrors the trend in abortions – as abortions went up, birth following ‘shotgun’ weddings declined at about the same rate, so the most immediate effect of legalisation was to permit women to avoid being propelled into marriage before they were ready.

SMFS:

I think you may be missing a point here.

The kind of counselling I’m talking about here is that required by some women who are uncertain or ambivalent about their decision.

That’s not the same as the pre-clinical assessment session that all women undergo when seeking an abortion, which is where they are informed on the clinical risks, alternatives, etc. before they make the appointment for the procedure.

So what is the problem here? Where, exactly is the issue? If Nadine Dorres is soooooooooo convinced that women require this counselling, what is stopping her from providing it? Why not put an hire a hall, put an advert in the paper and give out the advice to anyone who comes in? Isn’t that what the ‘Big Society’ is all about?

I have an opinion

Yeah and your type never let us forget that you ‘have an opinion’, do you?

Of course, merely having ‘an opinion’ is not good enough for the authoritarian, busy body Tories, is it? You find other people’s lives so fucking fascinating that you feel compelled to stick an unwanted nose into it.

It is not good enough for them to have ‘an opinion’, You want taxpayers money and a government mandated audience to pontificate at. You want the ‘Right’ to ram your unwanted ‘opinions’ down everyone else’s throat. Why? What do you get out of this? What is so fucked up in your lives that you are obsessed with everyone else’s?

I know a few vegetarians. They are passionate vegetarians, too, but they do not DEMAND the right to a booth at every McDonalds where the government forces, by law, every potential buyer of a happy meal to listen to a speech about factory farming, do they?

What about this for a comprise? You and the Tory/Christian cunts can sit in your churches and Conservative associations with your backward and weird mates and scream abuse at each and the decent, normal people can go and make their own minds on how to live their lives? That way, everybody wins, you and the nutters get to vent your spleen and the normal people live their lives how they want. Nope?

Here is a little thought for the Tories. My local church is free to enter, it is also empty. Is it possible that no one is in the least bit interested in what you people have to say?

@kojak #20:

If the number of abortions carried out has risen fourfold from legalisation to now is it not right to conclude they are being carried out for reasons which would have not been regarded appropriate when legalisation took place?

It is legal abortions that have increased fourfold since legalisation. One would have expected legal abortions to increase after the passing of the Act, and not necessarily all at once immediately after its passing; the whole point of the Act was to legalise abortions that were already taking place illegally to improve conditiosn for the women invovled, but within a framework acceptable to Parliament. It would have taken time, however, to convince many of the gatekeepers, the doctors, of the merits of the Act.

I will take a look at the statistics that Unity refers to, if I can find them.

Robin Levett re comment 24:

Thank you for your message.

One would have expected legal abortions to increase after the passing of the Act, and not necessarily all at once immediately after its passing; the whole point of the Act was to legalise abortions that were already taking place illegally to improve conditiosn for the women invovled

What you are suggesting is that total (legal + illegal) abortions have not risen. But it seems unlikely that women were still getting illegal abortions in significant numbers 25 years after it was legalised.

@vimothy #26:

What you are suggesting is that total (legal + illegal) abortions have not risen

No; I am suggesting that total abortions haven’t risen fourfold since legalisation. The baseline figure isn’t legal abortions in the year after the Act; it’s (or should be) legal plus illegal abortions in the final year before the Act was passed or, at a pinch, during the following year.

I agree that the correct baseline is illegal abortions in the year prior to legalisation.

Vimothy @ 28

I agree that the correct baseline is illegal abortions in the year prior to legalisation.

A useless baseline, though. Life and lifestyles have changed so much in fifty years that is looks pretty impossible to draw any conclusions on what has changed in how abortion is administered.

A useless baseline, though.

Not if you’re interested in the question: how much has the usage of abortion increased since its legalisation?

Apparently a bit of ultrasound to the bollocks will make you effectively sterile for three months, a free home ultrasound kit that plugs into the mains for every woman!

Vimothy @ 30

Not if you’re interested in the question: how much has the usage of abortion increased since its legalisation?

You have to assume that someone was stupid enough to ask such an idiotic question, though. The actual number of abortions in one year compared to another is irrelevant. The relevant data is was the trend for illegal abortion on the increase before the introduction of legal abortion rising, levelling off or decreasing. A static point on a graph is meaningless.

17. TONE

I find abortion very distasteful. Yet I can see that it can be – indeed, is often – the lesser of two evils. That said, I simply cannot see why the state has a role in this matter. Subject to minimal regulation – probably including mandatory pre-abortion counselling – abortion should be available on demand (at a small charge).

I find this attitude utterly incomprehensible. If abortion is a private issue that the State has no role in regulating, if it should be available on demand then presumably you do not think the foetus is a person. In which case why should you find it remotely distasteful? South Korea has just got upset about some pills from China which seem to be made from aborted foetuses. Apparently it is a minor industry – paying women to get pregnant and abort. If the foetus is just like a cancer, and ignoring the distaste you might have for medicine made from a cancer, why shouldn’t they? Why the disgust?

littlevigilante

A fetus isn’t a child, it’s a ball of cells that might one day become a child. And most abortions take place in the early stages of pregnancy, when an embryo is too small to even show up on a scan.

No, you mean that you think it isn’t a child. You think it is just a ball of cells. Some other person may think otherwise. Neither of you is in any position to say with any degree of certainty which is which. Although I note that medical science is pushing what we can say about its “childness” (like the ability to feel pain) ever further back, which suggests bad things for your argument.

For most women, abortion is a relief, not a lifetime of complicity – women who have abortions are not criminals.Your sententious moral misogynyis sickening.

Throwing insults is a sure sign of losing the argument. And it appears that large numbers of people are, at least, complicit in what looks like a crime. When abortion was illegal they all were. So that is not true either. How do you know that abortion is a relief for most women?

Unity

The trend in such births, in the first 5-6 years after abortion was legalised, mirrors the trend in abortions – as abortions went up, birth following ‘shotgun’ weddings declined at about the same rate, so the most immediate effect of legalisation was to permit women to avoid being propelled into marriage before they were ready.

An interesting assumption. Not true I would think given the rapid rise of pre-marital sex and changes in behaviour. But the interesting point is that you think this permits women avoiding being propelled into marriage before they were ready. I would think it permitted people to avoid being propelled into marriage before they thought they were ready. That is a different claim. I have no doubt that the relief at the end of shotgun marriages came mostly from men. Not from women. But in either case it was shared. Why do you think otherwise?

Unity

I think you may be missing a point here.

The kind of counselling I’m talking about here is that required by some women who are uncertain or ambivalent about their decision.

No I am not. This is precisely the sort of counselling I have in mind. And as everyone knows, the Catholics are going to offer a very different counselling service compared to those dedicated to the expansion of the abortion industry like the people quoted in the original article.

Counselling is not all the same.

Jim,

The question doesn’t seem that idiotic to me. If you would prefer to restate it in terms of the time-path of the process, that would be fine but it hardly seems to alter the meaning of my formulation in any major way.

If we are being pedantic for the sake of it (and I assume that we are), I might ask why it would be so important that the series was increasing or decreasing over some range. Since legalisation, the process seems to be monotonically increasing in a deterministic fashion. The idea that it was following the same process prior to legalisation isn’t one that makes a lot of sense, as far as I can see.

@vimothy #28:

I agree that the correct baseline is illegal abortions in the year prior to legalisation.

There were also some legal abortions being carried out; although not many.

That being said, the predominant estimate for illegal abortions at the time the Act was passed was around 100,000 annually; inter war estimates were of the order of 60-100,000 annually, with maybe 4-500 deaths per year from the effects of illegal abortions.

Given the change in population over 80-odd years, our legal abortion rate is not much higher now than the illegal abortion rate in the inter-war years.

Vimothy

Because comparing ‘1967’ to ‘2012’ in terms of abortion is meaningless. In the same way comparing the number of Black and whie TVs in 1967 to 2012 would be meaningless.

Abortion didn’t start in 1967, nor was abortion made legal on a whim, either. Abortion started because there was a need for it, and that need increased to the point that by the mid sixties, abortions were taking place in large enough numbers that it couldn’t be ignored. Abortion was made legal (rightly or wrongly) because abortions where happening in such high numbers a blind eye could no longer be turned to the numbers of women who died through preventable infections, botched jobs etc.

Now fast forward a few decades and it may (hypothetically) be true that number has risen. How could we tell though? Abortion was illegal in 1967, so the best estimate we have is from mainly digging about archives, etc. We are taking best guesses and comparing it with a legal procedure half a century later. And to what ends where we supposed to be comparing the two figures, anyway? What would the figure be today if we hadn’t legalised abortion in 1967? If the conditions that drove women to seek abortion where rising, then surely the number of abortions would rise, no?

Are we suggesting that if we banned abortion that abortion would cease? Again, based on what?