Population Puzzler: Unwanted Pregnancies and Abortion Trends
Last week, the National Center for Health Statistics issued the results of a survey revealing that the share of American births that resulted from unwanted pregnancies increased from 9 percent in 1995 to 14 percent in 2002. (Seattle Times reports here.)
That's bad news. It's also puzzling.
It's bad news because babies conceived by accident, when mothers do not want to have a child (or another child), tend to have what social scientists call "adverse outcomes," as discussed here. They're more likely to have bad prenatal care, die in infancy, fare poorly in school, and suffer violence at the hands of their caregivers.
It's puzzling because so many reproductive trends have improved since 1995. Pregnancy rates overall have fallen, as shown in this chart for Oregon . . .
