Here's Why Trump Can't Actually Ban Abortions

You can only ever outlaw safe and legal abortion. Regardless of whether I am pro-life or pro-choice in regards to my own body I will always be pro-choice in my political views. Reproductive rights are women's rights and women's rights are human rights. I refuse to accept the idea that the majority of abortions are used as birth control and I refuse to accept the disrespectful language that many politicians and people have used to describe abortions. Unfortunately not a lot of research is designated towards abortion because throughout history legislation has just been going back and forth between gag orders and then the repeal of those gag orders. However, the Guttmacher Institute is a nonprofit organization that researches reproductive actions in the United States including STI, abortions and teen pregnancy. The Guttmacher Institute reports that abortion patients are disproportionately poor--citing that 49% of women who have abortions live below the federal poverty line. In 2014 12% of abortion patients were adolescents (age 19 and below), and 62% of all patients reported some sort of religious affiliation. They also found that 39% of patients were white, 28% were black, and 25% were hispanic.

Guttmacher does not only collect the demographics of abortion patients but they also asked for their reasons behind getting abortions. The top 3 responses which were cited by 75% of patients were concern about their ability to care for another individual, they did not have the financial capability to raise a child, or felt that they could not perform the responsibility of a parent due to school, work or other dependents. They also found that 50% of patients did not want to be a single parent or were having problems with their partner. With the given statistics it appears that these patients, these people, and these women do not make this decision without forethought or consideration. Regardless of race, age, religious affiliation or anything else they felt that they could not deliver and take care of their possible child. These statistics are just for the United States, which is a first world highly developed country and still women experience unsafe abortions when they feel clinics, medical assistance and the government has failed to give them the opportunity to exercise their reproductive rights.

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World Health Organization reports that 21.6 million women experience unsafe abortions, and 47,000 die each year. In the United States prior to Roe v Wade there was an estimated 200,000 to 1.2 million illegal (and therefore unsafe) abortions occurred. After Roe v Wade only .6 per 100,000 abortions resulted in death. Legal abortion saves lives, and as the United States is a major world leader, and an example to the rest of the world we need to show that reproductive rights are human rights. Banning abortion and issuing gag orders does not eliminate abortions it simply places women at risk of serious injury and even death. I respect everyone’s opinions and ideas, but regardless of whether you are a pro-life personally, a pro-choice political view gives every women the right to make their own choice either way. There is no research that proves that abortion rates go down when legislation bans abortion, it simply puts women at risk. These patients feel strongly that they cannot raise their child or deliver the child and if they are willing to go to Planned Parenthood or other clinics then too often they will resort to unsafe measures. So regardless of what the current administration believes they can never ban abortions but only hurt the people they swore to protect and serve.