Counting the Cost of Abortion
(A look at the little-know and corrosive effects <Roe vs. Wade>
has had on American life.)
by Raul Acosta
More than 23 years have passed since <Roe vs. Wade> legalized
abortion-on-demand national wide, end the time to ask what
abortion has cost the United States economically, socially and
morally is long overdue.
Two recently published books do just that. "The Cost of Abortion"
(Four Winds, $7), by Lawrence F. Roberge, and "Lime 5: Exploited
by Choice" (Life Dynamics, $20), by Mark Crutcher, demonstrate
that abortion has and will continue to cost the American people
dearly.
And since the total number of abortions performed since 1973-when
the Supreme Court legalized the procedure -is far higher than
anyone has documented, the projected effects of abortion will be
far worse than either book could estimate.
From below-replacement levels of population to increased post-
abortion infertility and sterilization, a lower Gross Domestic
Product output, as well as the potential threat of invasion due to
weakened armed forces, Roberge shows the actual and scientifically
projected costs of abortion.
As abortions increased, for instance, fertility rates dropped.
"The total U.S. fertility rate from 1973-1989 has been below the
critical population-replacement level of 2.1 births per woman,"
Roberge writes.
Adoption has decreased as well, and even after factoring in
immigration, a net decline remains.
With the brush of dispassionate statistics, Roberge repeatedly
paints the "accumulative effects" of abortion, from lower student
enrollment and teacher employment to the lower amount of school
supplies produced and sold.
Ironically, the National Education Association is speeding its own
decline by supporting the abortion of its future pupils, notes
Roberge, a biomedical scientist and consultant.
But in the end, abortion harms not only certain segments of the
population, but every U.S. citizen.
"Aborted lives would have contributed to federal revenues via
labor performed, resulting in payment of income taxes and social
security," he writes.
Each aborted life also would have consumed federal revenue,
Roberge adds, but this "might be offset by the tax income
generated by goods and services purchased," as well as
unemployment insurance and business taxes collected by businesses
employing these lost lives.
Also, the missing generations of children, the so-called ghost
population, will be noticed more in the future.
"As federal taxation levels increase . . . more tax revenue is
<not> collected from the aborted lives," Roberge writes. "The
cumulative effect of these lost lives will be increasingly felt as
the U.S. enters the 21st century."
At what cost?
And what of the social cost? In "Lime 5," which takes its title
from the "name" one woman was given to use while in an abortion
clinic, Crutcher scrutinizes the personal toll the abortion
industry has taken on those it affects directly-the woman and her
abortionist.
Crutcher, founder and president of Life Dynamics, Inc., which
gives legal support to women injured by abortion, documents how
unsafe the procedure actually is.
Citing public records, Crutcher highlights more than 100 cases of
women dying from botched, incomplete and even unnecessary
abortions, all of which were legal.
In addition, more post-abortive medical complications are arising.
"Since abortion was legalized, ectopic pregnancies have
skyrocketed," Crutcher writes. "In 1970, there were 17,800, and by
1987 the number had swelled to 88,000."
Ectopic pregnancies are estimated to cause five to 10 percent of
maternal deaths. However, the secular media never reports these
facts, because, as Crutcher notes, it has "about the same
relationship to legitimate journalism as professional wrestling
has to legitimate sports."
Regarding abortionists themselves, "Lime 5" shows how many are
alcoholics, drug abusers and suicidal.
Many don't have hospital privileges, suffer chastisement from the
medical community, and, ironically, the abortion industry itself
dismisses them as mere "technicians." Also, many abortion doctors
have failed at general practice and are professionally trapped in
performing abortions.
They exhibit strange and cruel behaviors toward women seeking
abortions-and even toward their own families. Crutcher gives the
example of how one abortion doctor handcuffed his wife in the
bathroom and, without anesthesia, aborted his son.
"In the end, it is clear that abortion doesn't play favorites,"
Crutcher writes. "It devastates everyone it touches."
The abortion industry functions like no other medical entity,
"Lime 5"points out. It's the only industry that can effectively
usurp parental involvement, but not pay the follow up medical
costs of a problematic abortion, which happens a lot to teenagers.
Because of the politically and financially powerful pro-abortion
lobby, the abortion industry is practically immune to effective
monitoring or legal action.
Like the media, the abortion industry is also apparently committed
to a conspiracy of silence when it comes to policing itself.
For instance, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
(CDC), a supposedly neutral government entity, is responsible for
investigating abortion deaths, but the division which does so has
been de-staffed.
Incredibly, the CDC panel of experts consists of abortionists
themselves.
Crutcher documents how the CDC stalls the release of abortion-
death statistics and miscodes them to actually "cook the books" in
the abortion industry's favor.
In addition, CDC experts write articles on the "safety" of
abortion and cite other CDC pro-abortion members in a type of
"good-old-boy network."
Meanwhile, if an "outside" doctor or research scientist publishes
anything that contradicts the ridiculous claim that abortion is
safer than childbirth, the author is chastised and effectively
mocked by the medical community.
Today, there are more than 20 professional papers on the increased
likelihood of women getting breast cancer after ending their first
pregnancy. But the CDC mocks the evidence and won't address the
facts.
Furthermore, it won't acknowledge that abortion is directly
related to increased infertility rates, lower post-abortion birth
rates and maternal death by ectopic pregnancies.
Even the courts generally side with the abortionists, Crutcher
writes. According to his research, a woman seeking legal action
for damages-for anything from rape to mutilation-has only about a
27 percent chance of winning.
Yet Crutcher insists that after more than 23 years of abortion
"rights," the juggernaut abortion industry-like anything
totalitarian-is destroying itself by emotionally crippling clinic
workers.
In hospitals, corner clinics and even homes, abortion continues to
cost every man, woman and child a piece of their soul, he writes.
And what lies ahead for the United States? Both "Lime 5" and "The
Cost of Abortion" forecast that things will continue to get worse
before they better.
But for now, like the ghost population of millions of aborted
children, a question haunts Americans: how can this nation ever
pay what is perhaps the most crippling cost of abortion-the moral
cost? How can a society in which life is expendable ever undo the
damage and stem the rising tide of what Pope John Paul II has
called the "Culture of death"?
Acosta writes from Colorado Springs, Cola.
Taken from the August 4, 1996 issue of "Catholic Twin Circle." For
subscriptions contact: Catholic Twin Circle, P.O. Box 260380,
Encino, CA 91426-0380, (800) 421-3230.
Copyright (c) 1996 EWTN
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