Half of pregnant Spanish teenagers choose abortion

 July 6, 2004

If MADRID (AFP) - Half of Spanish teenagers who become pregnant abort their babies, according to a report which calls for more information to be made available about contraception.

It says that the rate of abortion among the 15 to 19 age group more than doubled between 1990 and 2001, rising from 21 percent of those becoming pregnant to 50 percent.

The rate of abortion among all women of child-bearing age rose from eight percent of those becoming pregnant in 1990 to 15 percent in 2001.

The figures for teenagers, with almost 10,000 abortions in 2001 compared to fewer than 5,000 in 1990, were described as "spectacular" by Margarita Delgado, head of the study of the evolution of abortion in Spain at the country's Higher Institute of Scientific Research (SCIC).

"The figures for Spanish adolescents are worse than those in neighbouring countries," she told a news conference in Madrid. "Spain is in a middle to high position and is going in the opposite direction from the European Union (news - web sites) where abortion numbers are tending to fall."

She said it was essential that sex education be introduced into the school curriculum so children became aware of contraceptive methods.

"The Netherlands have one of the lowest abortion rates because there is gradual and continual sex education from a young age."

The recently-elected Socialist announced in March it planned to ease the 1985 abortion law which permits abortion in three cases: serious risk to the physical or mental health of the mother; risk of physical or psychological malformation of the foetus; and conception after rape.

In 2002, 77,125 legal abortions were carried out, a rise of 10 percent on the preceding year, according to the health ministry.