A World Away

With all the pressures on our lives (work, family, volunteering, hobbies, working out) I think we all often forget we are a part of a larger world. Some of us fear getting involved in international women's issues because we don't want to look like know-it-all-American-women pushing our values on other women. Yet we also know that women in other countries desperately need our help and support.

Americans for the UN Population Fund has this great new tool/site that allows you to enter in your life story and then compare to another woman anywhere in the world.

I've just completed my lifeline at www.AmericansForUNFPALifelines.org and want you to do the same!

I can compare my life to the lives of women from all over the world. Women's lives vary in so many ways — Americans for UNFPA shows us how, even though our lives are different, we can still make a difference in our world.

Log on and set up your lifeline today and show your support for the health and dignity of women everywhere.

I did it last night while bored at all the walks the Rockies gave up to the Red Sox (seriously, we need a slaughter rule in baseball). It was pretty fun. I compared myself to a 60yo woman in South America and a 33yo woman in Asia. The similarities were striking more so than the differences.

Yes, the site is run by the same group that has been trying to get the USA to pay its dues to the UNFPA since Bush has been in office:

The U.S. Committee for UNFPA, now Americans for UNFPA, was founded in 1998. We are the official committee for UNFPA in the United States. We support UNFPA by generating awareness of UNFPA’s work, fundraising for field programs, and advocating for U.S. policies in support of UNFPA, including the release of Congressionally-allocated U.S. funds that have been withheld by the Administration since 2002.

So head on over to the site, create your profile. You can find me by putting my first name in the "look for friends" search box. Easy, eh? I did put in my profile pretty quickly so it's not as thorough as others on there.

More on the WHO/Guttmacher Report

The Chicago Tribune headline says it all:

Abortion rate same, legal or not

Having attended many a rally, meeting, workshop, and symposium on abortion and reproductive justice, I have heard many women and men repeat the line that women have been having abortions since women could get pregnant. I have been at events where women talk about having pre-Roe abortions, the fear of not knowing where they were going, where their best friend was going, or if their money would make it to Mexico.

The WHO/Guttmacher report firmly shows that no matter what, if a woman does not want to be pregnant, she will try anything to not be pregnant. Some will succeed, some will fail, and some will die trying.

The report shows that women living in countries where abortion is illegal STILL have them. The difference? Many of those abortions are in unsafe conditions. To think that only single, childless woman have abortions is to be ignorant of the situation. Women with children have abortions. They realize that they cannot feed one more mouth, that they are not healthy enough to carry a pregnancy to term, or that their lives are too dangerous to have a baby. When women die, families suffer. Not just the woman, the children she left behind, the elders she cares for, and perhaps the entire community if she plays a vital role.

So if we're going to have them, shouldn't they be safe?

Technorati tags: abortion, Planned Parenthood, international, women's health

Abortion rates decline around the world

And what's the secret?

BIRTH CONTROL!

According to a new report out this week, "the number of induced abortions worldwide declined from nearly 46 million to under 42 million between 1995 and 2003." The Guttmacher Institute and World Health Organization report reveals:

For every 1,000 women of childbearing age (15–44) worldwide, 29 were estimated to have had an induced abortion in 2003, compared with 35 in 1995. The decline was most substantial in Europe, where the rate fell from 48 to 28 abortions per 1,000 women, largely because of dramatic declines in Eastern Europe. On the whole, the abortion rate decreased more in developed countries, where abortion is generally safe and legal on broad grounds (from 39 to 26), than in developing countries, where the procedure is largely illegal and unsafe (from 34 to 29). Significantly, the abortion rate for 2003 was roughly equal in developed and developing regions—26 and 29, respectively—despite abortion being largely illegal in developing regions. Health consequences, however, vary greatly between the two regions, since abortion is generally safe where it is broadly legal and mostly unsafe where restricted. (emphasis mine)

The bad news is that unsafe abortions are still happening around the world and in countries where abortion is illegal at a rate that is astronomically higher than where abortion is legal:

The study also found that an estimated 20 million unsafe abortions occurred in 2003, 97% of these in developing regions. The prevalence of unsafe abortion remains high, with up to 39 unsafe abortions per 1,000 women aged 15–44 in Eastern Africa and 33 per 1,000 in South America. By contrast, developed regions, where almost all countries allow abortions with few restrictions, had an average unsafe abortion rate of two per 1,000. (emphasis mine)

Many progressives don't like the phrase "safe, legal, and rare" but this report seems to show that increasing access to birth control does make abortion rarer and by making abortion legal makes it safer. If that's what that phrase means, then I'm all for it.

Technorati tags: abortion, Planned Parenthood, international, women's health, , birth control