Abortion rise for over-35s in cash crisis
An increasing number of Irish women over 35 are having abortions.
New statistics have revealed that women from the Republic who were 35 years or older, accounted for 836 abortions last year -- up from 781 in 2009 and 720 in 2008.
Overall, 4,402 Irish women -- 12 a day -- had abortions in the UK in 2010, the ninth successive year a fall in numbers has been seen.
Speaking about the abortion trend among older women, Dr Stephanie O'Keeffe said: "In some respects the rate has not gone down as much as it has in other age groups. We don't have any evidence that the recession is impacting on these women but it could be.
"When you ask this age group why it was a crisis pregnancy you are more likely to be told that their family is complete. There may be relationship difficulties and it was not planned.
"They are more likely to report medical difficulties or that they had given birth recently. The younger people are more likely to say that they are too young and that the relationship is not steady."
She said older women have also said the reason they did not use contraception is that they thought they were going through the menopause.
She pointed out, however, that feedback from counselling services confirms that women are coming who are very troubled by financial difficulties."
"When you talk to women, they will speak about the workplace concerns and finances. We have to consider the recession as an issue but we don't have any evidence linking it to abortions in older women yet," she said.
Last year 565 of the women who travelled for abortions were in their mid to late 30s and 271 were over 40 years of age, the statistics from the UK's Department of Health revealed.
Women in their 20s were the age group with the highest number of UK abortions (2,318) while those their early to mid-30s were the second largest group (789).
There were 459 abortions among girls under 20 years, down from 511 in 2009. However, the number of abortions among teenagers under 16 went up to 41, compared to 38 the previous year and 28 in 2008.
Commenting on the figures Niall Behan, chief executive of the Irish Family Planning Association said the "harsh reality is that 12 women a day must travel to Britain to access safe and legal abortion services".
clairemurphy@herald.ie
- Claire Murphy
