Abortion Commentary in The Lancet

Gynuity’s Beverly Winikoff and Wendy Sheldon wrote a comment for The Lancet to accompany Sedgh et al’s article on global abortion rates and trends between 2003 and 2008. The data showed that after nearly a decade of steep declines, the global abortion rate stagnated in the period from 2003-2008. In addition the share of abortions worldwide that were unsafe rose from 44% to 49% in this same period. Winikoff and Sheldon emphasize that “it is precisely where abortion is illegal that it must become safer” and note “the public health community will not be able to address maternal mortality adequately and attainment of Millennium Development Goals is questionable until we directly confront the issue of unsafe abortion”. They also call for a re-examination of the definition of unsafe abortion that take into consideration innovations in abortion care such as medical abortion. Both the article and commentary have generated considerable press interest and been cited by BBC News, Bloomberg, The Guardian, the New Zealand Herald, and other news sources. The full commentary can be read at this link.