Virginia African-American Women Not Represented in Abortion Debate Despite Higher Rate of Abortion

Main Category: Abortion
Article Date: 05 Mar 2005 - 16:00 PDT

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African-American women in Virginia are "noticeably not part" of the debate on abortion-restriction legislation in the state Legislature despite having abortions at three times the rate of white women, the... Richmond Times-Dispatch reports. "We take for granted it's really a white person's thing," Day Gardner -- director of Black Americans for Life, part of the National Right to Life Committee -- said, adding, "I thought [the abortion rate] was about the same within all races." However, federal and state data show that African-American women, proportionally, have about three times as many abortions as white women. According to Virginia Department of Health data, African-American women in 2003 had a rate of 30.2 abortions per 1,000 women ages 15 to 44, compared with white women who had a rate of 12 abortions per 1,000 women. Abortion-rights supporters say the higher rates are linked to a "reproductive health crisis" among African-American women, which also includes a lack of adequate health insurance, higher rates of childbirth-related deaths and reproductive cancers and a lack of education on sexual health issues, according to the Times-Dispatch. Antiabortion advocates are trying to "actively enlist" African-American and other minority women to oppose abortion within their communities, although current representation is "spotty," the Times-Dispatch reports (Smith, Richmond Times-Dispatch, 3/3).

"Reprinted with permission from kaisernetwork.org kaisernetwork.org. You can view the entire Kaiser Daily Reproductive Health Report, search the archives, or sign up for email delivery at www.kaisernetwork.org/dailyreports/repro The Kaiser Daily Reproductive Health Report is published for kaisernetwork.org, a free service of The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation . © 2005 Advisory Board Company and Kaiser Family Foundation. All rights reserved.

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