Some pro-choice advocates suggest that abortion should be “safe, rare, and legal.” But what if it’s not safe at all?

Well, the abortion-choice advocate can point out that maternal deaths have gone down significantly in the history of abortion. Medically “safe” practices have expanded to give more options and methods to reduce undue risks. That said, it is naive to suggest that abortion is a safe, neutral or even a good option.

Death isn’t safe.
The child always dies in an abortion, and that’s hardly safe. And in those rare cases of botched abortions where the baby survives, there are still abortion-rights advocates who think that infanticide is permissible.

Intrinsic Risks
Because of intrinsic risks in abortion procedures, the sheer number of injuries and deaths has risen, in spite of advances in medical technology and safety practices. Legalized abortion has fostered a much higher abortion rate than anyone in the early 1970’s could have imagined. What was thought to be in the order of 10,000 or so abortions ballooned up to over 1,000,000+ per year, a 10-fold growth. Even with relatively “safe” practices, there is always some incidence of malpractice and accidents so that injuries and death occur. The percentages have lowered for botched abortions, maternal injury, and maternal death, but because of the swollen numbers abortions, the sheer amount of injuries and death have gone up.

Moral Harms
Morally, it’s not safe to one’s conscience to conduct willful killing of human life. The human conscience is a malleable thing, and it’s risky to stretch and tear at it with such morally questionable practices like abortion. Such practices invariably involves playing God, determining death for another innocent human being. Cultural Corruption Culturally, the abortion industry has been a major step towards a “culture of death.” We compromise our moral character as a culture when we treat willful convenience killing like its justified and good. Similarly, sympathies have grown for active euthanasia and physician assisted suicide, and the “sanctity of life” view has waned as the “quality of life” view has grown.

Economic Damage
Economically, it’s not safe to link killing and profits. The abortion industry is literally in the business of death-profiteering. Sure it’s normally okay to make lots of money through legal measures, but, in the long-run it’s a self-defeating venture to make money off of killing millions of future employees, future tax payers, and future family members. Who will take care of the present baby booming generation? With 1-2 children to each household there are fewer family options to turn to. More often than not, that role has to be farmed out to nursing homes. That’s expensive. And of course, it’s immoral to put a profit incentive on baby-killing. If the argument against monetizing death ever worked regarding “war for oil” accusations, the abortion industry has amped it up ten fold (in the order of 58 million abortions).

Social Risks Socially, an “abortion climate” continues to ease and affirm sex outside of marriage–which is unsafe to society. How is it unsafe to society? The sex industry has skyrocketed ever since the “free-love” sixties raising divorce rates, raising the rates of sex slavery, raising the profitability and lowering the inhibitions about pornography, raising the incidence and varieties of VD’s, not to mention causing a whole lot of naive young ladies heartbreak when they’ve “put out” only to find that the boy lost interest in them after using them for sex.

Legal Dangers
Legally speaking, abortion is a rapists best friend. Rapists and sex traffickers don’t have any need for babies. Pregnant victims carry around DNA evidence (the baby) for at least 9 months and get into conversations about the father. But sex offenders want silent victims and no evidence–abortion serves both purposes.  One would think that abortion clinics would anticipate this potential problem and never let it happen. But unfortunately Clinics have been known to comply with those crimes.

Medical Dangers
Medically speaking, and with some disputation, its not even safe for the mother. Maternal mortality has declined in the 20th and 21st centuries, but given the heightened incidence of infertility, and suicide rates among abortive mothers suggest it’s not safe for them either. Psychologically, with abortion, the chances of depression and post-traumatic stress disorder skyrocket for women who’ve had an abortion. Likewise increased are such social problems as abuse and divorce. We can’t say that the social factors are “caused” by abortion, but they seem to be found together suggesting something like, “Women who have abortions are more likely the people who get in abusive relationships and who get divorced, whether or not the abortion causes those things.” Many studies have sought to mitigate other studies claiming that abortion generates mental health problems. This facet of the “safety” issue is not settled but there do remain current, vindicating, sources pointing towards the widely admitted fact that having an abortion is traumatic. By self-report, women are known to turn to drug and drink, and escalate prior mental health issues, all correlating with their abortion. Given these facts one cannot honestly say that abortion is safe. The best case one can make, while being honest about the facts, is that it is a necessary evil in regards to some really tough cases.

*Originally posted May 13, 2015 at IntelligentChristianFaith.com