More women have repeat abortions

By MONIQUE DEVEREUX health reporter

The number of women having more than one abortion is rising, as is the abortion rate itself, Government statistics show.

Last year, 33.5 per cent of the 16,103 abortions performed were on women who had already had one.

Family Planning clinical director Christine Roke said the increase in "repeat" abortions could be a reflection of changing attitudes.

"More women than before are considering abortions as an option, so that might naturally progress to more women having more than one."

However, she said, those who did have abortions were not becoming "blase" about it.

"It is still a very traumatic experience for a woman to go through."

The statistics showed a 4 per cent rise in abortions from the year before, and Ms Roke said that could be partly due to the contraceptive pill thrombosis scare.

But it was not as high as the expected 6.5 per cent increase.

In its 2000 report, the Abortion Supervisory Committee calculated that 16,500 abortions would have been performed by year's end, compared with 15,501 the year before, and said the pill scare would be behind the rise.

Many women stopped using the pill when it was revealed that certain types put users at a greater risk of developing potentially fatal blood clots.

University of Auckland researchers who reviewed 400 cases of women seeking an abortion in mid-1999 had found that "panic-induced" stopping of oral contraceptives was a factor in 9.5 per cent of the pregnancies.

The statistics also gave a breakdown of ethnicity, and showed that Asian women had the highest abortion rate in New Zealand, at 311 abortions per 1000 pregnancies.

This compared with 210 per 1000 for European women.

Ms Roke attributed this to the different cultural attitude of Asian people, especially the Chinese.

Abortion is common in China because of the one-child rule.

Ms Roke said Asians were often surprised by the strict conditions governing abortion in New Zealand.

The most common age group for women having abortions last year was 20 to 24, which accounted for three out of every 10 abortions performed, or 36 abortions per 1000 women in that age group.

Women aged 25 to 29 came next, at nearly 25 per 1000 women. Third was the teenage group (15 to 19), which had nearly 24 per 1000.

The overall abortion rate rose by 1.2 per cent to 19 per 1000 women aged 15 to 44, which is higher than for the Netherlands, Germany and Finland but lower than Australia and the United States.