Angela Rivas
Professor Finnigan
ID:912326173
10/23/14
Abortion: A Social Issue Social issues continue to arise everyday. Abortion is a topic that has been disputed over for many years. The topic has two opposing sides, one being whether a woman should have the right to have an abortion and two, whether the unborn baby should have some type of law protecting it's right to life. Abortion is a social problem because many feel that it is a woman’s right to decide what she wants to do with her body, and rejecting the right to abort would signify that women to not hold the same moral status as men.
Abortions can be defined as the termination of a woman’s pregnancy. This can be done by either legal procedures practiced by a doctor, however, in many cases, women have gone to the extreme of performing it themselves because they are afraid that society will criticize them. According to an abortion surveillance report done by the CDC, in 2010, the abortion rate for women aged 15-44 years was 14.6 abortions per 1,000 woman, of which 40% were in the low class and/or of African American/Hispanic ethnicity. The legal procedure is performed by a giving a pill to the woman that will terminate the life of the fetus or a shot is given that stops the baby’s heart and a suction tube is inserted into the cervix to clear out any fetal tissues. After 23 months, the legal procedure cannot be performed because it can be fatal to the woman.
In the United States Constitution, it states that all men are created equal. This means no individual has more rights than someone else. By denying abortions, woman would not hold the same rights as men. Woman, just like men, should be able to decide what she wants to do with her body.
Many couples continue to have unprotected sexual intercourse, which many times results in pregnancy. Others practice safe sex, however, proper protection sometimes is defective, and birth control isn't one hundred effective. The result is an unwanted pregnancy, and leaves women desperate to terminate their pregnancy. Most woman seek abortions because they cannot afford to care for the child, interferes with her work/school, or are concerned for the other individual.
If we denied the practice of abortions, we would potentially put her career at risk. When a woman is pregnant, it disrupts her body and leaves her in a constant state of fatigue. This minimizes her capability of performing simple actions such as studying or concentrating whether it be at work or school. Also, when a woman is pregnant she go on maternal leave, and many jobs do not pay for the weeks she is absent, causing her to become behind on any payments she has.
Not only can denying abortions lead to poverty but can also lead to woman becoming depressed but more severely can physically harm the womans body. It has been reported that woman have practiced abortions by using unsanitary clothes hangers and inserting it into