Thesis (MPH.) --University of Limpopo, 2015 / Background: There are a high number of teenagers seeking Termination of Pregnancy (TOP) at Maggys Hope Clinic in Polokwane Municipality in Capricorn District in Limpopo Province after the Termination of Pregnancy Act was passed in 1997. The numbers have doubled since the inception of the Children's Act no 38 of 2005 and the Sexual Offences Bill in 2008. The report by Stats SA and Department of education also indicated that the numbers have also doubled. Objective: The aim of the study was to determine the factors contributing to termination of pregnancies amongst teenagers at Maggys Hope Clinic in Polokwane Municipality, Limpopo Province. Methods: An exploratory, descriptive qualitative research design was used to identify and describe the factors contributing to termination of pregnancies among teenagers in Maggys Hope Clinic in Capricorn district Limpopo Province South Africa, in April 2014. Results: The results of the study revealed that CTOP legislation is one of the reasons why teenagers terminate. All the twenty participants indicated age and marital status as the motivation as the contributing factor. Looking at the age and educational level the most pushing factor is that thirteen of the participants are still at school. Eleven of the participants have no knowledge of contraceptives. This is a serious concern. Participants indicated that they had very little knowledge on reproductive health issues. The rest of the pushing factors are parental pressure, contraceptive failure, fear of parental disappointment and unpreparedness to raise a child as well. Conclusion: It can thus be concluded that teenage termination of pregnancies is a major health concern in South Africa, Africa and globally. Teenagers’ health is in danger due to engaging in unprotected sex banking on TOP as a solution. The study found that age and fear from dropping out of school, lack parental involvement in sexual matters, family economic status and marital status, including lack of knowledge and information on reproductive health issues, were the main factors contributing to termination of pregnancies among teenagers in Maggys Hope Clinic in Capricorn District, Limpopo Province.

Intimate partner violence (IPV) against women is a major public health issue worldwide. The purpose of this dissertation is to characterize violence perpetrated by an intimate partner against a "high-risk" group of pregnant women who sought elective abortion services at a family planning clinic. Analyses were based on the Iowa Women's Health Experience Survey (IWHES), a cross-sectional study of 519 abortion patients who completed an anonymous, self-administered questionnaire over a period of seven months. IWHES eligibility criteria were 'Seeking pregnancy termination'; 'Age ≥ 18 years'; 'Iowa resident' and 'Fluent in English or Spanish'. The survey instrument covered physical, sexual and psychological types of violence, health correlates of violence as well as demographic, socioeconomic and lifestyle characteristics of participating women and their current intimate partners. Aim I examined the prevalence of physical, sexual and/or psychological abuse by employment characteristics of elective abortion patients and their current intimate partners. Aim II examined associations of substance use, depression and social support with physical, sexual and/or psychological abuse perpetrated by current intimate partners against women seeking pregnancy termination. To achieve the analytic goals of Aims I and II, the study sample was restricted to women who had a current partner and valid IPV data. The overall prevalence of physical, sexual and/or psychological abuse perpetrated by a current partner was 12.3%, with some overlap between the different IPV sub-types. In general, the prevalence of IPV did not differ significantly by employment status or by broadly defined occupational groups of women and their partners. However, a trend was noted whereby a woman's employment and a partner's unemployment were associated with greater likelihood of IPV. Specifically, the prevalence of IPV was highest among couples where the woman was employed and the partner was unemployed. Consistently positive associations were noted between the partner's (but not the woman's) substance use indicators (alcohol intake, binge drinking, recreational drug use) and IPV. Higher levels of depressive symptoms and less perceived availability of social support were noted among women who had experienced IPV versus those who had not experienced IPV. The association between depressive symptoms and IPV was stronger for women who reported having children in their homes compared to those did not report having children in their homes. Implications for policy and future research are discussed.

Because Latinos are the largest, fastest-growing ethnic minority group in the U.S., learning more about their sexual and reproductive experiences and decision-making processes is important. Importantly, although sexuality and abortion are stigmatized in many Latino cultures and conservative religious beliefs specifically oppose abortion, Latinas have the highest birth rates in the U.S. and an estimated one in four pregnancies to Latina women are terminated (Jones, Darroch, &Henshaw, 2002; Jones, Finer, &Singh, 2010). Consequently, nuanced exploration of contradictions in reproductive behaviors and cultural and religious values is critical to supporting women's health and well-being. Seeking to advance the scholarship on the lived experiences of women who undergo elective abortion, this dissertation used Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis and a cultural and religious lens to explore the decision-making processes and phenomenological experiences of four young Mexican-American women who elected to terminate their first pregnancy. Results indicated that the women in this study believed abortion was unique, and more difficult for Mexican-American (and other Latina) women, given cultural and religious norms that specifically prohibit abortion and simultaneously prioritize sexual purity, responsibility, and motherhood for women. The complexity and difficulty inherent in navigating overlapping and oftentimes contradictory sociocultural and religious values are discussed as they relate to the participants' abortion decision and experience. The manuscript concludes with strengths and limitations of the present study, suggestions for future research, and implications for psychologists. Keywords: Mexican, Latina, Abortion, Reproductive Health

The purpose of this study was not to judge the rightness or wrongness of Planned Parenthood. It is an empirical question to ask what influence, if any, Planned Parenthood has had on reproductive behavior in the State of Utah. This was accomplished by gathering data from each county in the State of Utah from 1970 to 1979. The data gathered were for the five dependent variables of General Fertility, General Abortion, General Illegitimacy, Teen Fertility and Teen Illegitimacy. A mean rate for each county and variable was computed. Each county was also weighed per population so as to give counties with large populations more weight than counties with small populations. A comparison of the rates in counties with Planned Parenthood and counties without Planned Parenthood was then made. It was noted that counties with Planned Parenthood had higher rates for each variable except General Fertility which was lower than counties without Planned Parenthood. But the differences were not of a significant level. In most cases the differences already existed before Planned Parenthood was established.

L’objectif de cette thèse est d’établir une ethnographie des formes de la mémoire de l’interdiction de l’avortement dans le régime totalitaire de Ceausescu. Entre 1966 et 1989, le régime communiste roumain a imposé des politiques pronatalistes, au nom du : binele natiunii socialiste (« le bien de la nation socialiste »). Une construction de la maternité comme « tradition roumaine » a été ainsi développée, en parallèle d’une stricte interdiction de l’IVG, et de la mise à l’écart des moyens contraceptifs modernes. La remémoration sociale de ce passé difficile reste encore un tabou dans la société roumaine d’aujourd’hui. Il semblerait qu’en Roumanie actuelle cette remémoration-faible joue un rôle important dans la santé reproductive, et qu’elle est déterminée par des relations d’intersubjectivité entre les différentes formes de la mémoire du pronatalisme, c'est-à-dire la mémoire officielle, la mémoire culturelle (publique) et la mémoire sociale-partagée. L’analyse développée sur ces formes et leurs relations d’intersubjectivité a pour base un terrain anthropologique (2004-2009) sur la mémoire de l’avortement en Roumanie communiste, et fut réalisée dans le domaine interdisciplinaire des Études mémorielles. / Taking the pronatalism of Ceausescu’s regime as a case study, this thesis is an an ethnography of the memory-formes of a recent delicat past, such as the banning of abortion in a totalitarist regime. From 1966 to 1989, the communist regime imposed extreme policies of controlled demography in Romania, as it was imputed, for ‘the good of the socialist nation’. A construction of maternity as ‘Romanian tradition’ was developed in parallel to the banning of abortion on request and the making of contraception almost inaccessible. The social remembering of such a difficult past is still a taboo in contemporary Romanian society. This law-remembering, which is maybe playing an important role in the current situation of Romania’s reproductive health, is influenced by the intersubjectivities devellopped between the different forms of pronatalist memory, i.e. its official memory, its cultural memory and its social memory. The analysis of those memory-formes and their intersubjectivities is based on an anthropological fieldwork (2004-2009) on the memory of abortion in Communist Romania, and is theoretically informed by the interdisciplinary field of Memory Studies.

Abstract not available

<p>Bakgrund: Den svenska abortlagen från 1 januari 1975, ger den gravida kvinnan rätt att själv bestämma om hon vill avbryta graviditeten. Mannens roll och behov nämns inte alls.</p><p>Syfte: Att belysa kvinnors och mäns upplevelser och behov av stöd under abortprocessen.</p><p>Metod: En systematisk litteraturstudie med 16 vetenskapliga artiklar analyserades och kvalitetsgranskades.</p><p>Resultat: Litteraturstudien visade på abortupplevelsen som en jobbig period i livet men det resulterade även i en beslutsamhet och mognad.</p><p>Diskussion: Resultatet tyder på att det är nödvändigt att få en ökad förståelse för den individuella vårdtagarens behov och förväntningar av vården och behandlingen. För att få en förståelse för mångsidigheten i abortsituationen bör man synliggöra både mannens och kvinnans delaktighet.</p><p>Konklusion: Männens upplevelser av abortprocessen är föga outforskade. Sjuksköterskans roll i processen är betydelsefull och därför är det oerhört viktigt att personalen innehar kunskap och intresse att kunna bemöta dessa patienter.</p>

<p>In this modern period, societal and religious groups are strongly divided regarding the acceptability of abortion. Despite so many attempts by various groups to find a middle ground, the debate on abortion still remains largely polarized, at its most dramatic point with the extreme conservatives claiming abortion to be the moral equivalent of murder and the extreme liberals see it as devoid of moral import. And this polarization is due to the legal battle that continues to shadow moral discussions. An acceptance of an ethical nuance will here play as a concession on the deeply contested question of whether abortion should be a legally protected option for a woman, and to an extent blame for the continued crudeness which can be laid at the doorstep of a moral theory itself. Apparently, the ethical literature on abortion has focused almost exclusively on the tiniest moral assessment on whether and when abortion is morally permissible. This question is a crucial one indeed and its answer is desperately sought in this thesis by exposing the position of the Catholic Church.</p>

<p>The modern world is facing a revolutionary development in the clinical medicine and biomedical sciences. Due to the different life supporting systems, it is easily possible to keep patients with severe diseases alive. With organ transplantation a lot of people, who would otherwise die can live long and happy lives. In vitro fertilization allows a woman to bear the child that is not genetically related to her. Due to the possibility of contraception, safe abortions and prenatal diagnosis, women and couples can make preferable choices concerning their future child. Such medical developments and improvements have a great impact on our life, and provoke a lot of ethical questions and moral dilemmas.</p><p>The aim of this thesis is to answer the question whether prenatal diagnosis can be justified as it mainly leads to the selective abortion, whether and when the fetus counts as a person and whether the prospective parents can perform selective abortion on the basis of fetal disability; and to discuss ethical problems that are experienced by the doctor, who brings the news into the family and what is his/her role in the decision-making process.</p>

<p>The aim of this study is to describe and analyze how the European union relates to the different dimensions of abortion. What kind of problem is abortion and whose right is it? Does difference framings of the problem enable different solutions?</p><p>By analyzing debates from the European parliament through Carol Lee Bacchis method “What’s the problem approach” I have come to see that different representations of a problem changes the problem it self. This emphasis that a problem is a problem in one context, but not in an other.</p><p>Depending on the work of, among others, Barbara Hobson and Ailbhe Smyth I have focused upon the European union as a economical project, leaving social issues to national competence. This makes the EU a patriarchal project that fails to guarantee women’s rights. By not being able to assure women the right of abortion, the women of Europe is treated as second class citizens.</p><p>Through the eyes of the European union my material has shown that abortion is not only a conflict between the woman’s right to choose and the child’s right to live, but also a conflict of democracy. National sovereignty is challenged by a European citizenship of women.</p><p>The right to information and the right to freedom of movement within the EU puts the European question of abortion in a new focus. By framing the problem of abortion as a problem of mobility it enables a way of placing women’s right in the free market system. A Europe that allows women to choose where to perform an abortion, and also provide them with information on contraceptives and the morning-after pill, is a Europe that falls within the idea of the EU as a economical project.</p>