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It was recently published that in New York City, 40% of pregnancies are terminated by abortion. I have been unable to track down the source of this data, and more importantly how many of these abortions were surgical and how many were chemically induced. I believe this would be useful information to include as a statistic for all of the United States as well as in specific areas such as large cities (NYC, etc..) and rural areas —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.2.238.74 ( talk) 05:11, 22 January 2011 (UTC)
Year | Number of reported abortions | % medical abortions | reference |
---|---|---|---|
1995 | 697,990 | ??? | [1] |
1996 | 725,403 | ??? | [2] |
1997 | 743,618 | 0.4% | [3] |
1998 | 727,666 | 0.7% | [4] |
1999 | 698,136 | 0.9% | [5] |
2000 | 685,834 | 1.0% | [6] |
2001 | 703,839 | 2.9% | [7] |
2002 | 700,615 | 5.2% | [8] |
2003 | 699,548 | 7.9% | [9] |
2004 | 689,084 | 9.6% | [10] |
2005 | 668,662 | 9.9% | [11] |
2006 | 688,859 | 10.5% | [12] |
Shouldn't there be something about the Philadelphia murder case and Kermit Gosnell? Rspyker ( talk) 16:51, 22 January 2011 (UTC)
I ran across this article and thought it may be helpful. [13] WikiManOne ( talk) 07:00, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
Germany has abortion on choice in the first trimester (2nd and 3rd: illegal except for mothers health or life in danger). The map should be changed accordingly. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.158.178.31 ( talk) 00:57, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
Ref #76 in this revision: Web of Trust scores it as a very untrustworthy site. Is that true, and if so, can we replace it somehow? NW ( Talk) 05:39, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
In this edit (without an edit summary), Ritterhude ( talk · contribs) introduced a novel piece of text based on a single recent primary study. I reverted it with the edit summary Reverted good faith edits by Ritterhude (talk); Section is a summary of Abortion and mental health and explained to him on his talk page that this section of the article is a summary of Abortion and mental health, pointing out the {{ main}} template. He has now re-inserted the text with the edit summary Recent research reflecting current scientific thinking, especially if briefly summarized, is always appropriate. The main article is arranged for long discursive sections per study.
I believe the text inserted:
I am therefore seeking consensus to remove the paragraph in question. I'd be quite happy to see discourse at Abortion and mental health about reasons why a primary source that is unsupported by any secondary might be used, but here it completely fails WP:UNDUE. Thoughts? -- RexxS ( talk) 20:42, 29 January 2011 (UTC)
Just a grammatical change to the sentence: "As Wicklund crisscrosses the West to provide abortion services to remote clinics, she tells the stories of women she's treated and the sacrifices herself and her loved ones made." Change "herself" to "she", the correct pronoun. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.231.169.46 ( talk) 05:48, 24 February 2011 (UTC)
Anyone know what happened to the image discussion, I haven't been at the page for a over a week. Is it archived? Closed? What was the result? DMSBel ( talk) 16:27, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
Ok I see it is archived in archive 40. How come? It was on this page for months. Who archived it? It was a live discussion, and now it is just swept away with no indication (that I can see at least) or reason given for archiving it. I'd like to assume there is a good reason for it being archived, but I'd as soon hear what that reason was. DMSBel ( talk) 16:46, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
But this page is currently the second hit on Google on a search for 'murder'. See this screencap [14]. Anyone know why? The word 'murder' is used here, but not prominently. I suppose it's probably just a Google bomb. Robofish ( talk) 16:29, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
I firmly believe nothing should be done to the article itself to affect this, whether it be removing content, quotations, etc. Reacting to such things by altering our content gives power to the creators of Google bombs and sends a message that they can have a wide effect. Kansan ( talk) 22:18, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
Just a minor move so that the picture of the 10 week old fetus is beside the relevant text. It had been beside spontaneous abortion (ie. miscarriage) but that's not what the picture is of. It is corresponding to theraputic abortion. If reverting please discuss here. DMSBel ( talk) 22:36, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
This article is heavy on debunking notions that abortion has adverse effects on women, but is light on the effects that abortion has on the embryo or fetus. I think this article should say more about what abortion does, and not just what it doesn't do. It's not enough to just say that an abortion causes the death of an embryo or fetus. It would be much more informative to say, for example, that an abortion after X weeks stops a beating heart, an abortion after Y weeks stops a fetus that has started to move its head and limbs, an abortion after Z weeks ends a life that stood a better than even chance of surviving to birth, an abortion after P weeks ends the life of a being in which all major human organs exist, et cetera. These are some of the developmental milestones that various legislatures, civilizations, ethicists, and/or pregnant women have deemed to be possibly significant with regard to the morality of abortion.
Now, one could respond by saying that a reader of Wikipedia could easily just go to the articles about the fetus or embryo to find out about these characteristics, but that's incorrect. Those articles do not attempt to single out characteristics relevant to abortion, and indeed there are many aspects of prenatal development that have significance for reasons completely unrelated to abortion. Any thoughts about whether this article should try to do better in this regard? There is a vast literature about the possible moral implications of aborting at various different times in pregnancy, and yet this Wikipedia article mentions none of it. Anythingyouwant ( talk) 22:39, 21 February 2011 (UTC)
For starters, can we insert the following into this article?
“ | The death of an embryo or fetus has different aspects depending on when during pregnancy it occurs, and these developmental milestones sometimes influence the decision whether to perform, permit, or obtain an abortion. For example, an abortion after about five months of pregnancy destroys a "viable" fetus that possibly could have survived a premature birth with modern medical technology. | ” |
This would be a good start. An article like this ought to mention viability. Anythingyouwant ( talk) 13:41, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
I think the thing is that this article basically discusses abortion from a medical point of view. The societal stuff is mostly split into separate articles. You aren't going to find MEDRS-compliant sources talking about how "abortion stops a beating heart!!!1!!one!" because the MEDRS sources on prenatal development don't tend to make it all about abortion. That's why I think this sort of thing belongs in the Abortion debate article. Roscelese ( talk ⋅ contribs) 06:40, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
Does anyone object to the addition of a tag:
This article may be weighted too heavily toward only one aspect of its subject. |
per current discussion? DMSBel ( talk) 13:15, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
1. Wikipedia Elective surgery states: "Elective surgery is surgery that is scheduled in advance because it does not involve a medical emergency. Semi-elective surgery is a surgery that must be done to preserve the patient's life, but does not need to be performed immediately."
2. Medicinenet.com defines the term Elective surgery as follows: "Surgery that is subject to choice (election)...As opposed to urgent or emergency surgery." [ [15]]
3. Medicinenet.com defines the term Elective as follows: "In medicine, something chosen (elected). An elective procedure is one that is chosen (elected) by the patient or physician that is advantageous to the patient but is not urgent. Elective surgery is decided by the patient or their doctor. The procedure is seen as beneficial but not absolutely essential at that time." [ [16]]
4. Wikipedia Surgery states: "Types of surgery: Surgical procedures are the commonly categorized by urgency, type of procedure, body system involved, degree of invasiveness, and special instrumentation. Based on timing: Elective surgery is done to correct a non-life-threatening condition, and is carried out at the patient's request, subject to the surgeon's and the surgical facility's availability. Emergency surgery is surgery which must be done promptly to save life, limb, or functional capacity. A semi-elective surgery is one that must be done to avoid permanent disability or death, but can be postponed for a short time. Based on purpose: Exploratory surgery is performed to aid or confirm a diagnosis. Therapeutic surgery treats a previously diagnosed condition."
Thus a reasonable person would conclude that non-emergency therapeutic surgery is a subcategory of elective surgery. Nearly all surgical abortions are NOT emergency procedures (in other words, they are scheduled procedures and are not medical emergencies).
It seems that this Abortion article's inartful use of the terms "elective" and "therapeutic" confuses the reader rather than clarifying important distinctions. One would use "elective" to describe a procedure based on the timing of the surgery. One would use the term "therapeutic" to describe a procedure based on whether there has been a diagnosis. The 2 terms are not mutually exclusive.
If the terms "elective" and "therapeutic" are to be applied consistently (with no politically correct definitions for procedures performed on pregnant women), then virtually all therapeutic abortions are also elective procedures. Practically speaking, in nearly all modern situataions the 2 terms will be mutually inclusive because modern medicine considers the satisfaction of any woman's desire to no longer be pregnant (regardless of the reason why she no longer wants to be pregnant) as "therapeutic", and abortion is virtually NEVER performed under emergency conditions (in other words: there are virtually no occurences in which an abortion must be done immediately to avoid a serious health risk).
The current section of this article called "Induced" [ [17]] contains a false dichotomy when it states: "Reasons for procuring induced abortions are typically characterized as either therapeutic or elective. An abortion is medically referred to as a therapeutic abortion when it is performed to: ... An abortion is referred to as elective when it is performed at the request of the woman "for reasons other than maternal health or fetal disease.".
This false dichotomy should be corrected by helping the reader understand that the 2 terms therapeutic and elective are virtually synonymous, rather than leading the reader to incorrectly think that an abortion is EITHER elective OR therapeutic. Rarely will any therapeutic abortion not also be elective.
Finally, using the term "therapeutic" also implies that the condition of being pregnant is a disease or a health defect, when in reality, absent any political use of medical terminology, pregnancy is a sign of a healthy reproductive system and is never a disease. There are extremely rare occassions when organs of or near the reproductive tract are diseased and an abortion could thus be therepeutic to the gravid woman (though fatal to the fetus).
Perhaps this wording would address these concerns:
An induced abortion is almost always both elective and therapeutic, meaning that it is a non-emergency surgery performed based on a prior diagnosis. Induced abortions are performed for various reasons, including:
^ source: [ [18]] (Findings from 32 studies in 27 countries were used to examine the reasons that women give for having an abortion... Worldwide, the most commonly reported reason women cite for having an abortion is to postpone or stop childbearing. The second most common reason—socioeconomic concerns—includes disruption of education or employment; lack of support from the father; desire to provide schooling for existing children; and poverty, unemployment or inability to afford additional children. In addition, relationship problems with a husband or partner and a woman's perception that she is too young constitute other important categories of reasons.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.233.18.28 ( talk) 21:37, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
You have both possibly not carefully digested my entire original comments. Item #4 in the original comment quotes wikipedia's own general explanation for when a surgical procedure is called "therapeutic". I am simply advocating that the use of terminology in the abortion article be consistent with the terminology used in the surgery article (which accurateluy uses the term therapeutic). The term therapeutic" does NOT mean "to preserve the life or health of the mother", and the abortion article should not use it or define it in such a way.
With regard to pregnancy, a "diagnosis" is actually a determiniation of the cause of a deviation from homeostasis [see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical_diagnosis#Diagnosis_in_medical_practice] or of a "medical condition" [see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disease#Medical_condition], so I wouldn't avoid that word "diagnosis".
I do not think the word "therapeutic" is helpful to the abortion article, but I have presumed that people will not want to eliminate the word from the article. My proposed language is certainly sourced and is not original research.
Also, there is no need for the AGI source article to mention the two words (elective or therapeutic) as the article is referenced for the REASONS women choose to have an INDUCED abortion, which is the very subheading (Induced) of the abortion article content we are discussing.
The main reality that the article should elucidate is that virtually all induced abortions are "elective" (meaning they can be scheduled a day or a week out without any harm to the gravid female's health), and virtually all induced abortions are therapeutic (meaning they come after a diagnosis). Barring the very rare (almost unheard of) exception, induced abortions are always elective and therapeutic.
The article as it appears now contains a confusing and imprecise and inaccurate discussion of the terms "elective" and "therepeutic". The artcle as it appears now contains an inaccurate conflation of the term "therapeutic" (inaccurately defined as non-elective) with a list of reasons a woman might have an elective abortion, and a false conclusion that other reasons would make it a non-therapeutic elective abortion. The article contains false information now that appears geared toward convincing the reader that abortions are most often "therapeutic" (with accompanying langauge that implies a therapeutic abortion is medically necessary) and that abortions are not very often elective. But the research (the most comprehensive of which was commissioned by and is propagated by abortion advocacy group AGI) comes hands down against that conclusion.
I have revised the suggested NEW wording:
An induced abortion is almost always both elective (a non-emergency procedure) and therapeutic (scheduled after a diagnosis of pregnancy). Induced abortions are performed for various reasons, including:
67.233.18.28 ( talk) 18:32, 3 March 2011 (UTC)
The MedTerms.com definition for "therapeutic abortion" at
[19] is "An abortion that is brought about intentionally," which comports with the general definition of the word "therapeutic" (related to a treatment after diagnosis of a medical condition).
The American Heritage dictonary [20] defines "therapeutic abortion" as
The Gale Encyclopedia of Medicine [21] defines therapeutic abortion as "the intentional termination of a pregnancy before the fetus can live independently". This definition comports with the language I am suggesting because the term is independent of any serious medical threat to the mother's health (although this definition is also problematic because in practice there are medical doctors in good standing who will induce fetal demise of a fetus that is capable of living independently, and there are laws that protect such abortions).
The wikipedia article for therapeutic abortion is likewise poorly written and inaccurate in that it ascribes a colloquial meaning to a medical term, when there is no evidence that the term "therapeutic abortion" is even used colloquially. That article avoids any mention of the actual medical term of art, when that is the most common and rational starting point for an article about that term. "Therapeutic abortion" seems to be a term that is most often used incorrectly by abortion advocates in an effort to paint most abortions as medically neccessary, when the bulk of research and testimony confirms that abortion is almost never medically necessary. But wikipedia should not propagate such usage when the definition for the medical term can so easily and readily be confirmed.
In any event, the scholarly article at this link [22] asserts that "Most providers consider all terminations to be elective, or a voluntary decision made by the patient herself." This assertion supports my suggestion that the wikpedia main article convey to the reader that most typically, an abortion is elective, and that because the termination of any unwanted pregnancy is de facto deemed to be "therapeutic", therefore all abortions are both elective and therapeutic. The only exceptions are the very rare cases when a pregnancy actually threatens a woman's life.
Here is yet another revision of the suggested NEW wording:
An induced abortion is almost always both elective (a non-emergency procedure) and therapeutic (scheduled after a diagnosis). Induced abortions are performed for various reasons, including:
76.2.124.88 ( talk) 18:21, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
What is there now in this "Induced" section of the article is terrible. As it stands, it is a mish-mash admixture conflation that needs to be fixed if readers are to actually benefit from the section. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.3.237.145 ( talk) 01:33, 6 March 2011 (UTC)
Under unsafe abortion there is currently this sentence, sourced to a NY Times article:
"however, generally equating "safe" abortion to "legal" abortion is controversial."
But the NY Times article doesn't say this. It makes it clear that the study's findings were conclusive, not ambiguous, when it comes to the connection between legal status and safety:
"Moreover, the researchers found that abortion was safe in countries where it is legal, but dangerous in countries where it was outlawed and performed clandestinely."
"But the legal status of abortion did greatly affect the dangers involved, researchers said. 'Generally, where abortion is legal it will be provided in a safe manner,' Dr. Van Look said. 'And the opposite is also true: where it is illegal, it is likely to be unsafe, performed under unsafe conditions by poorly trained providers.'"
The only mention of any kind of dispute over the study's findings is this:
"Anti-abortion groups criticized the research, saying that the scientists had jumped to conclusions from imperfect tallies, often estimates of abortion rates in countries where abortion is illegal. 'These numbers are not definitive and very susceptible to interpretation according to the agenda of the people who are organizing the data,' said Randall K. O'Bannon, director of education and research at the National Right to Life Educational Trust Fund in Washington.
He said that the major reason women die in the developing world is that hospitals and health systems lack good doctors and medicines. 'They have equated the word 'safe' with 'legal' and 'unsafe' with 'illegal,' which gives you the illusion that to deal with serious medical system problems you just make abortion illegal,' he said."
This isn't a "controversy." It's one person's unqualifed personal assessment of a World Health Organization study. This personal assessment certainly shouldn't be given the kind of weight it's being given in the article now. Reddestrose ( talk) 07:07, 6 March 2011 (UTC)
I looked at the two sources mentioned, and now I see the problem runs deeper. The first is over 50 years old, the second nearly 20. Both focus on the impact of illegal abortion in the US (the first mainly, the second exclusively). Why rely on outdated and localized sources when the 2007 Lancet study is recent and global? Reddestrose ( talk) 20:23, 6 March 2011 (UTC)
Looking at the article history I see the first sentence of unsafe abortion was changed yesterday. The first sentence originally read:
"One of the main determinants of the availability of safe abortions is the legality of the procedure."
This sentence should be restored, sourced to the 2007 Lancet study. It reflects current scientific understanding. The sentence in the article now is based on outdated sources - one of them over half a century old. Reddestrose ( talk) 22:59, 6 March 2011 (UTC)
The NY Times article (and thus the 2007 Lancet study) is not being used to support the part about the impact of legal status on safety, rather it's being used to support the part about "controversy." The part about the impact of legal status on safety is based on two outdated sources, one 51 years old. Not to mention that it's original research to present data specific to one country (America) as representative of the entire world. So the current sentence in the article presents outdated data as current and localized data as global. This is an inaccurate and needs to be changed. Reddestrose ( talk) 03:16, 7 March 2011 (UTC)
There has been considerable coverage in the news over recent years on the issue of forced abortion. The article does not refer to this at all. See [23], [24], [25], [26], [27]. DMSBel ( talk) 19:04, 9 March 2011 (UTC)
According to the very top of this talk page, it appears the rules at this article have just changed considerably. One would have thought that the relevant discussion would have been mentioned here before the decision was made. Anythingyouwant ( talk) 22:49, 26 February 2011 (UTC)
At the top of the article there is currently a notice which says:
"This article is weighted too heavily toward only one aspect of its subject."
All the major aspects are covered: medicine, law, history, debate, culture. Some areas may need to be expanded, but I don't think any particular aspect's coverage is disproportionate enough to warrant this notice. Reddestrose ( talk) 23:32, 6 March 2011 (UTC)
(Undent) Just a brief note about the recent tagging of the article. While I do believe that this article is slanted, biased, and incomplete for various reasons that I've mentioned above and previously, I have tried to tackle the issues one by one, which is time-consuming because a lot of research is necessarily involved. My time is limited. As I said above, "When time permits, I'll look at what reliable sources have to say on this subject, and then report back here." While I think tagging this article would be helpful to readers, tagging would probably not be successful without ongoing attempts to hash out the problems. I don't have time to do that at the moment, and that's why I haven't tried to tag the article. Anythingyouwant ( talk) 15:32, 10 March 2011 (UTC)
1. Wikipedia Elective surgery states: "Elective surgery is surgery that is scheduled in advance because it does not involve a medical emergency. Semi-elective surgery is a surgery that must be done to preserve the patient's life, but does not need to be performed immediately."
2. Medicinenet.com defines the term Elective surgery as follows: "Surgery that is subject to choice (election)...As opposed to urgent or emergency surgery." [ [31]]
3. Medicinenet.com defines the term Elective as follows: "In medicine, something chosen (elected). An elective procedure is one that is chosen (elected) by the patient or physician that is advantageous to the patient but is not urgent. Elective surgery is decided by the patient or their doctor. The procedure is seen as beneficial but not absolutely essential at that time." [ [32]]
4. Wikipedia Surgery states: "Types of surgery: Surgical procedures are the commonly categorized by urgency, type of procedure, body system involved, degree of invasiveness, and special instrumentation. Based on timing: Elective surgery is done to correct a non-life-threatening condition, and is carried out at the patient's request, subject to the surgeon's and the surgical facility's availability. Emergency surgery is surgery which must be done promptly to save life, limb, or functional capacity. A semi-elective surgery is one that must be done to avoid permanent disability or death, but can be postponed for a short time. Based on purpose: Exploratory surgery is performed to aid or confirm a diagnosis. Therapeutic surgery treats a previously diagnosed condition."
Thus a reasonable person would conclude that non-emergency therapeutic surgery is a subcategory of elective surgery. Nearly all surgical abortions are NOT emergency procedures (in other words, they are scheduled procedures and are not medical emergencies).
It seems that this Abortion article's inartful use of the terms "elective" and "therapeutic" confuses the reader rather than clarifying important distinctions. One would use "elective" to describe a procedure based on the timing of the surgery. One would use the term "therapeutic" to describe a procedure based on whether there has been a diagnosis. The 2 terms are not mutually exclusive.
If the terms "elective" and "therapeutic" are to be applied consistently (with no politically correct definitions for procedures performed on pregnant women), then virtually all therapeutic abortions are also elective procedures. Practically speaking, in nearly all modern situataions the 2 terms will be mutually inclusive because modern medicine considers the satisfaction of any woman's desire to no longer be pregnant (regardless of the reason why she no longer wants to be pregnant) as "therapeutic", and abortion is virtually NEVER performed under emergency conditions (in other words: there are virtually no occurences in which an abortion must be done immediately to avoid a serious health risk).
The current section of this article called "Induced" [ [33]] contains a false dichotomy when it states: "Reasons for procuring induced abortions are typically characterized as either therapeutic or elective. An abortion is medically referred to as a therapeutic abortion when it is performed to: ... An abortion is referred to as elective when it is performed at the request of the woman "for reasons other than maternal health or fetal disease.".
This false dichotomy should be corrected by helping the reader understand that the 2 terms therapeutic and elective are virtually synonymous, rather than leading the reader to incorrectly think that an abortion is EITHER elective OR therapeutic. Rarely will any therapeutic abortion not also be elective.
Finally, using the term "therapeutic" also implies that the condition of being pregnant is a disease or a health defect, when in reality, absent any political use of medical terminology, pregnancy is a sign of a healthy reproductive system and is never a disease. There are extremely rare occassions when organs of or near the reproductive tract are diseased and an abortion could thus be therepeutic to the gravid woman (though fatal to the fetus).
Perhaps this wording would address these concerns:
An induced abortion is almost always both elective and therapeutic, meaning that it is a non-emergency surgery performed based on a prior diagnosis. Induced abortions are performed for various reasons, including:
^ source: [ [34]] (Findings from 32 studies in 27 countries were used to examine the reasons that women give for having an abortion... Worldwide, the most commonly reported reason women cite for having an abortion is to postpone or stop childbearing. The second most common reason—socioeconomic concerns—includes disruption of education or employment; lack of support from the father; desire to provide schooling for existing children; and poverty, unemployment or inability to afford additional children. In addition, relationship problems with a husband or partner and a woman's perception that she is too young constitute other important categories of reasons.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.233.18.28 ( talk) 21:37, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
You have both possibly not carefully digested my entire original comments. Item #4 in the original comment quotes wikipedia's own general explanation for when a surgical procedure is called "therapeutic". I am simply advocating that the use of terminology in the abortion article be consistent with the terminology used in the surgery article (which accurateluy uses the term therapeutic). The term therapeutic" does NOT mean "to preserve the life or health of the mother", and the abortion article should not use it or define it in such a way.
With regard to pregnancy, a "diagnosis" is actually a determiniation of the cause of a deviation from homeostasis [see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical_diagnosis#Diagnosis_in_medical_practice] or of a "medical condition" [see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disease#Medical_condition], so I wouldn't avoid that word "diagnosis".
I do not think the word "therapeutic" is helpful to the abortion article, but I have presumed that people will not want to eliminate the word from the article. My proposed language is certainly sourced and is not original research.
Also, there is no need for the AGI source article to mention the two words (elective or therapeutic) as the article is referenced for the REASONS women choose to have an INDUCED abortion, which is the very subheading (Induced) of the abortion article content we are discussing.
The main reality that the article should elucidate is that virtually all induced abortions are "elective" (meaning they can be scheduled a day or a week out without any harm to the gravid female's health), and virtually all induced abortions are therapeutic (meaning they come after a diagnosis). Barring the very rare (almost unheard of) exception, induced abortions are always elective and therapeutic.
The article as it appears now contains a confusing and imprecise and inaccurate discussion of the terms "elective" and "therepeutic". The artcle as it appears now contains an inaccurate conflation of the term "therapeutic" (inaccurately defined as non-elective) with a list of reasons a woman might have an elective abortion, and a false conclusion that other reasons would make it a non-therapeutic elective abortion. The article contains false information now that appears geared toward convincing the reader that abortions are most often "therapeutic" (with accompanying langauge that implies a therapeutic abortion is medically necessary) and that abortions are not very often elective. But the research (the most comprehensive of which was commissioned by and is propagated by abortion advocacy group AGI) comes hands down against that conclusion.
I have revised the suggested NEW wording:
An induced abortion is almost always both elective (a non-emergency procedure) and therapeutic (scheduled after a diagnosis of pregnancy). Induced abortions are performed for various reasons, including:
67.233.18.28 ( talk) 18:32, 3 March 2011 (UTC)
The MedTerms.com definition for "therapeutic abortion" at
[35] is "An abortion that is brought about intentionally," which comports with the general definition of the word "therapeutic" (related to a treatment after diagnosis of a medical condition).
The American Heritage dictonary [36] defines "therapeutic abortion" as
The Gale Encyclopedia of Medicine [37] defines therapeutic abortion as "the intentional termination of a pregnancy before the fetus can live independently". This definition comports with the language I am suggesting because the term is independent of any serious medical threat to the mother's health (although this definition is also problematic because in practice there are medical doctors in good standing who will induce fetal demise of a fetus that is capable of living independently, and there are laws that protect such abortions).
The wikipedia article for therapeutic abortion is likewise poorly written and inaccurate in that it ascribes a colloquial meaning to a medical term, when there is no evidence that the term "therapeutic abortion" is even used colloquially. That article avoids any mention of the actual medical term of art, when that is the most common and rational starting point for an article about that term. "Therapeutic abortion" seems to be a term that is most often used incorrectly by abortion advocates in an effort to paint most abortions as medically neccessary, when the bulk of research and testimony confirms that abortion is almost never medically necessary. But wikipedia should not propagate such usage when the definition for the medical term can so easily and readily be confirmed.
In any event, the scholarly article at this link [38] asserts that "Most providers consider all terminations to be elective, or a voluntary decision made by the patient herself." This assertion supports my suggestion that the wikpedia main article convey to the reader that most typically, an abortion is elective, and that because the termination of any unwanted pregnancy is de facto deemed to be "therapeutic", therefore all abortions are both elective and therapeutic. The only exceptions are the very rare cases when a pregnancy actually threatens a woman's life.
Here is yet another revision of the suggested NEW wording:
An induced abortion is almost always both elective (a non-emergency procedure) and therapeutic (scheduled after a diagnosis). Induced abortions are performed for various reasons, including:
76.2.124.88 ( talk) 18:21, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
What is there now in this "Induced" section of the article is terrible. As it stands, it is a mish-mash admixture conflation that needs to be fixed if readers are to actually benefit from the section. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.3.237.145 ( talk) 01:33, 6 March 2011 (UTC)
The very first paragraph and it contains misleading and inaccurate information: "In the context of human pregnancies, an abortion induced to preserve the health of the gravida (pregnant female) is termed a therapeutic abortion, while an abortion induced for any other reason is termed an elective abortion."
This sentence falsely represents what a therpaeutic abortion is. Most therapeutic abortions are NOT performed because there is a risk to the gravid woman's health. Virtually all therapeutic abortions are also ELECTIVE (i.e. "non-emergency"). The current language in the article skews these facts. 67.233.18.28 ( talk) 21:53, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
Apparently this concern over the misuse of the word "therapeutic" in this article is being ignored because you folks can't think of any good reasons not to edit the article in to account for the problem that has been highlighted. Or perhaps one of you can fix the article. I won't register because wikipedia's freezing policy is biased and hypocritical, which means I can't edit the article - but that does not mean I can't point out the blatant error this article contains.
67.233.18.28 (
talk) —Preceding
undated comment added 21:29, 6 April 2011 (UTC).
How sad that no editors will even seriously discuss these legitimate criticims. Having the article locked is ridiculous. —Preceding
unsigned comment added by
71.3.237.145 (
talk) 02:04, 26 April 2011 (UTC)
I overhauled this section. It seems best to start out with a definition. Anythingyouwant ( talk) 03:46, 18 March 2011 (UTC)
More to the point, these are sources that you've selected. It's not clear why you've selected these, in preference to the existing high-quality, up-to-date sources that you've downplayed. You're using these new sources to replace conclusions from the previously existing sources, but that's not an appropriate use of these sources. They don't "rebut" the existing sources, and it's an artificial editorialization to use them that way. We should be synthesizing these sources, if anything, rather than cherry-picking them. MastCell Talk 05:01, 18 March 2011 (UTC)
I'm not sure I see a big shift in the meaning of the article between the versions, but I must comment that the tone above seems rather more heated than necessary. The rush of wp:BOLD edits by Anythingyouwant was perhaps precipitous, but the breadth of MastCell's reversion was not helpful either. May I suggest that we agree to go back to the version prior to MastCell's reversion then look one at a time at the preceding edits (in reverse time order) to discuss if they should stand or be reverted? Then when that's finished, we can get on with the fixing details in the resultant mix (such as the citation formats). At the moment fixing those would only complicate matters. LeadSongDog come howl! 15:55, 18 March 2011 (UTC)
To the extent that undue frustration has seeped into my comments, it springs from my perception of a focused, long-standing effort to minimize or downplay the link between abortion's legality and its safety, a link that (whatever one's personal opinions on the subject) is acknowledged as central and uncontroversial by all reputable medical and public-health sources. I perceive a long-term effort to obscure the content of these sources where their findings are ideologically objectionable to individual editors; hence the frustration. The best solution is the involvement of additional outside editors; in the meantime, I will endeavor to improve my tone, starting by ignoring the immediately preceding comment. MastCell Talk 16:25, 18 March 2011 (UTC)
1. Ok, so this was the last edit. It clearly is in error, attributing present tense to a 2005 document. Ultimately this would better have read "as of ... was". If we can agree on that, I'll revert for now and add that to a list of changes to make later. LeadSongDog come howl! 17:34, 18 March 2011 (UTC)
2. The edit before that was this one. It did two things. Naming a reference to Blas p.182 for an existing statement that cites it would be uncontentious, but also citing it while replacing "where health care is at a generally low level" with "where affordable well-trained medical practitioners are not readily available" when neither statement is truly supported by the reference here, at least not on the cited page 259. Perhaps a more judicious reading of the source(s) would help with this edit. LeadSongDog come howl! 19:04, 18 March 2011 (UTC)
The principal social determinant of recourse to unsafe abortion is real or perceived legal restriction on safe abortion. Developing countries are much more likely to restrict access to legal abortion than developed countries, and the restrictions disproportionately affect poorer women. [39]
As to the edit in question, I have a weak preference for the version favored by LeadSongDog, but overall I don't feel strongly that one version is better than the other. Mostly, I think the overall way we present these sources is misleading, but presumably we can address that as we unwind the stack of recent edit a bit further. MastCell Talk 20:36, 18 March 2011 (UTC)
I know it's the weekend, so I'll try to be patient, but I don't see a lot of independent support for enshrining AYW's unilateral and disputed text on this high-profile article, over the pre-existing, relatively stable text (which should really be the starting point, if we were following WP:BRD). I do think more input would help move things forward, so tomorrow I'll probably solicit some from WP:MED or from other editors who have recently been active here. MastCell Talk 18:43, 20 March 2011 (UTC)
(undent) Just as a .02 for glancing at it (never looked at this article before, so I have no idea what the previous version was and I'm going to bed now instead of looking it up), the statements like "Unsafe abortions sometimes occur where abortion is legal, and safe abortions sometimes occur where abortion is illegal" followed by lots of cites (this line is also in the main article with only one citation) seem redundant as it's a level of detail that's best left for the main article. Honestly, I think we should take the lead section for that main article and start from there. More than two paragraphs here is too much when we have an entire article to read. Honestly, I think we could chop out everything but a brief explanation (the current definition and an example adds four lines of text but only ten words of information), two or three of the "big picture" statistics like the 48% and the one-in-eight, and maybe another line or two out of the lead of the main article. The objective is to summarize the main, not have enough information that we start worrying about the two pages disagreeing about it. SDY ( talk) 06:33, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
Unsafe abortion is a public health concern due to the higher incidence and severity of complications, such as incomplete abortion, sepsis, hemorrhage, and damage to internal organs, and the term "unsafe abortion" has a specific definition. An abortion is called "unsafe" if it is by a person without proper medical training, such as the woman herself, or by a qualified person operating in sub-standard conditions. [1]
Restrictive abortion laws are associated with a high rate of unsafe abortions. Worldwide, complications of unsafe abortion cause 13% of all maternal mortalities, and unsafe procedures accounted for 48% of all abortions performed in 2003. [2] [3] [2] [4] [5]
Unsafe abortions are defined as those performed by people lacking proper medical training (including self-induced abortion) or in sub-standard conditions. [1] This is a major public-health concern due to the high incidence and severity of complications, such as incomplete abortion, sepsis, hemorrhage, and damage to internal organs. Restrictive abortion laws are associated with a high rate of unsafe abortions. citation needed Worldwide, complications of unsafe abortion cause 13% of all maternal mortalities, and unsafe procedures accounted for 48% of all abortions performed in 2003. [2] [3] [2] [4] [6]
(Undent) Again, for the umpteenth time, I have no objection to saying that "Restrictive abortion laws are associated with a high rate of unsafe abortions." But I strongly object to omitting that other factors are associated with a high rate of unsafe abortion: namely the unavailability of modern contraceptives, and also the unavailability of affordable skilled practitioners, both of which often occur where abortion is legal as well as where it's illegal. Just consider contraceptives; reliable sources say that if they were available then the number of unsafe abortions would decline by 73% from 20 million to 5.5 million, with no change in abortion laws. [40] Anythingyouwant ( talk) 23:57, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
Developing countries with restrictive abortion laws | Developed countries and developing countries without restrictive abortion laws | |
---|---|---|
Unsafe abortions | 19,600,000 | 400,000 |
Safe abortions | 22,000,000 |
Type and location | Number of abortions |
---|---|
Safe abortions (52%) | 22,000,000
|
Unsafe abortions in developing countries with restrictive abortion laws (47%) | 19,600,000
|
Unsafe abortions in developed countries and developing countries without restrictive abortion laws (1%) | 400,000
|
I'd like to add this to the section on unsafe abortion:
“ | Incidence of unsafe abortion would be reduced by about 73% without any change in abortion laws, if modern contraceptives were made readily available.[1] Rates of unsafe abortion also remain high in some countries where abortion is legal because clinicians are poorly trained or facilities are inadequate.[2] | ” |
[1]Singh, Susheela et al.
Adding it Up: The Costs and Benefits of Investing in Family Planning and Newborn Health (New York: Guttmacher Institute and United Nations Population Fund 2009)
[2]Blas, Erik et al.
Equity, social determinants and public health programmes, pages 182-183 (World Health Organization 2010).
Anythingyouwant (
talk) 00:24, 22 March 2011 (UTC)
(undent) It's more than adequately covered in the main article, frankly. Six of one or half dozen of the other as to leaving it all to the main and/or including several details here. The other question I have is where we should put the unsafe business. I think it flows a lot better if it's included in the safety section. Minor quibbles to text aside, what are the thoughts on the general plan I suggested here. SDY ( talk) 15:02, 22 March 2011 (UTC)
I support insertion of Rexx's suggested sentence: ""Incidence of unsafe abortion could be reduced by as much as 73% without any change in abortion laws, if modern family planning and maternal health services were readily available." Once it is inserted, then I would support putting the word "contraceptive" into the sentence, because that is what the source says. A reason why 73% of unsafe abortion occurs is lack of modern contraceptives, so the 73% figure belongs in this article. Anythingyouwant ( talk) 19:04, 22 March 2011 (UTC)
(undent) I'd prefer to leave it to the main article, especially since the statistic we're talking about is not in that article. If nothing else, anything "new" here must be also added to unsafe abortion, and I'm a little leery of including it as a "super-important part of the summary" when no one has been bothered to even mention it on Wikipedia until now. It's an interesting fact, and certainly relevant to the discussion, but it's largely a question of "now that unsafe abortion exists, what do we do with it?" and that's a question and discussion that's best left to the main article. I would prefer to include here what has been done about it, another topic that's not covered in the main article. The best idea, in my opinion, would be just to steal the following line from the other article's lead: "Most unsafe abortions occur where abortion is illegal,[3] or in developing countries where affordable well-trained medical practitioners are not readily available,[4][5] or where modern contraceptives are unavailable.[6]" SDY ( talk) 01:44, 23 March 2011 (UTC)
We had this
<blockquoteThe legality of abortion is one of the main determinants of its safety. Restrictive abortion laws are associated with a high rate of unsafe abortions.
Changed to this
Unsafe abortions sometimes occur where abortion is legal, and safe abortions sometimes occur where abortion is illegal.
The refs better support the former rather than the latter. Doc James ( talk · contribs · email) 07:03, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
(undent) Technichally, this isn't about abortion safety, this is about a specific technical term ("unsafe abortion") that's designed to capture data about the types of abortions that are performed. We have a section in the article on safety. If the person who is performing an abortion is a badly trained doctor working in a sparsely equipped but functional hospital setting, it's not safe as safe as it should be but the operation does not meet the definition of "unsafe." Contrariwise, an operation performed at home by an excellent doctor with impeccable technique might have very low risks indeed, but it would still meet the definition of "unsafe." Pulling this in, can we remove the link "health risks of unsafe abortion" (redundant) and just call the "health risks" a "complications" section like we do for other surgeries? SDY ( talk) 14:39, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
In several countries, the legalization of abortion has not been followed by elimination of unsafe abortion.; (2) Faúndes, Aníbal and Barzelatto, José. The Human Drama of Abortion: a Global Search for Consensus, page 21 (Vanderbilt University Press 2006); (3) Blas, Erik et al. Equity, social determinants and public health programmes, pages 182-183 (World Health Organization 2010); (4) Safe Abortion: Technical and Policy Guidance for Health Systems, page 15 (World Health Organization 2003).
Regarding deaths from illegal abortion, I agree that these would presumably be relatively rare in a developed country where the complications of unsafe abortion can be treated rapidly and effectively. But death is not the only variable here. Even with good medical care, unsafe abortion can result in uterine scarring, future infertility, hospital stays, increased medical spending, and all of the downstream effects of these non-fatal complications. I don't think we should convey the idea that if unsafe abortions don't outright kill women, then they're no big deal. I don't think that viewpoint is contained in reliable sources, nor does it seem to make much sense. MastCell Talk 17:06, 7 April 2011 (UTC)
This map is better. 188.118.146.242 ( talk) 17:43, 31 March 2011 (UTC)
(undent) again here is the ref for all countries from the UN http://www.un.org/esa/population/publications/abortion/profiles.htm So please just list the countries that are incorrect per the above ref and I am sure they can be quickly fixed. Doc James ( talk · contribs · email) 23:04, 6 May 2011 (UTC)
from above site:
With regard to the countries Anythingyouwant mentioned (Egypt, Iran, Syria, Yemen, Oman, Lebanon, and UAE) these all permit abortion only on ground of risk to life of the woman.
The section therefore should at least be tagged until this is cleared up.
Is there not a basic map with country names somewhere in WP Commons that could be edited to change colours? My geography is not great and it would help checking if the country names were on the map.
DMSBel ( talk) 21:10, 10 May 2011 (UTC)
Which of these tags:
This article may not provide
balanced coverage on a geographical region. |
This section's factual accuracy is
disputed. |
would be best? DMSBel ( talk) 12:26, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
I am a graphics person. I'd be glad to create a new map if it will solve this dispute. Could someone give me concise, yet detailed instructions on what needs to be changed? Is there consensus on that front? If there is, it seems simple enough to just make a new map, and I'd gladly do that. Also, inline dispute tags are better than section tags if the whole section isn't what is in dispute, but instead a single image...- Andrew c [talk] 16:25, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
According to the source used in the article (World Abortion Policies 2007) the following countries only permit abortion on the ground of saving the life of the mother:
Africa: Djibouti, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Somalia, Angola, Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Gabon, São Tomé and Príncipe, Egypt, Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, Lesotho, Côte d'Ivoire, Guinea-Bissau, Mauritania, Niger, Senegal
South-Central Asia: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Iran (Islamic Republic of), Sri Lanka
South-Eastern Asia: Brunei Darussalam, Indonesia, Myanmar, Philippines
Western Asia: Lebanon, Oman, Syrian Arab Republic, United Arab Emirates, Yemen
Europe: Ireland, Andorra, San Marino, Monaco
Caribbean: Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Haiti
Central America: Guatemala, Honduras
South America: Paraguay, Suriname
Melanesia: Solomon Islands
Micronesia: Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Micronesia (Federated States of), Palau
Polynesia: Tonga, Tuvalu
If we just take out the "...and in some countries physical and/or mental health" from the legend (refering here to the map currently in the article, not the one above) it would reduce the amount of changes needed to a minimum. 62.254.133.139 ( talk) 17:17, 12 May 2011 (UTC)
Any objections? DMSBel ( talk) 14:08, 13 May 2011 (UTC)
but it still needs some changes. For instance Spain's abortion legislation has changed, (I had not been aware of this before uploading). Important Please Note if making changes, some previous changes to earlier maps were to change the status of countries from the de jure (legality of abortion) to the de facto (actual practice). This section is on abortion law, not abortion practice, make sure that any changes are representative of the legal status of abortion in the various countries. DMSBel ( talk) 13:42, 14 May 2011 (UTC)
According to the FAQ, "in the first quarter of 2009, various encyclopedic images related to abortions that show an intact embryo and fetus have been introduced to the article". As of today, those images have been completely removed. OrangeMarlin says there's no verification that the image is what the caption says it is. Well, the OB GYN who took the picture in India has stated what it is, and it sure isn't an ice cream cone or a windmill.
In the spirit of "no censorship", maybe it would be better to have an image that actually shows the blood and guts, but this image has been the compromise for years.
OrangeMarlin's edit summary is this: “Absolutely no verification that this is actually a photograph of a 10 week old fetus.” If the objection is the "10 week" figure in the caption, then the caption could have been edited without removing the image. Moreover, the "10 week" figure is attested to by the creator of the image, and it is also confirmed by looking at the size of the fetus in relation to the hand holding it. A fetus at 10 weeks LMP (i.e. 8 weeks after fertilization) has a crown to rump length of 3 centimetres (1.2 in) which is consistent with the image. Anythingyouwant ( talk) 08:49, 12 May 2011 (UTC)
Secondly, removing and photographing the fetus after such an operation is unusual, to say the least. Posting such a photograph on Flickr is perhaps even more unusual. Given the large number of... unusual aspects associated with this photo, I think we should not use it. I'm not personally totally comfortable trusting an anonymous Flickr user's assertions about the photo for our purposes. I doubt that any other serious, respectable reference work (e.g. Britannica) would include a photo with such poorly attested provenance. MastCell Talk 21:36, 12 May 2011 (UTC)
(outdent)Well if we're going for age, I believe I've been here longer than Anythingyouwant; but frankly how long you've been editing any particular article is not generally useful. We don't give points for longevity. OTH, what might be relevant is that Anythingyouwant is still under sanctions for disrupting Arbortion related articles in order to push his POV. See Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Ferrylodge#Ferrylodge restricted. I suggest he back off a little from trying to get another inflammatory image inserted in this article. Had I been paying attention when it was added, I would have said something at the time. KillerChihuahua ?!? Advice 23:26, 12 May 2011 (UTC)
No one has actually addressed my core objection. We know nothing about this photo's provenance beyond what has been provided by an anonymous Flickr user. I think that is far, far below the bar we should aspire to use to illustrate medical articles. Again, no serious, respectable reference work on Earth would use an anonymously uploaded Flickr photo of unknown provenance to illustrate a medical article.
As a secondary concern, the image is in no way typical of therapeutic abortion - in fact, it's extraordinarily atypical. Using it as one of the (relatively few) photos in this article is misleading.
Finally, perhaps we can dispense with arguments that "other crap exists on Wikipedia" as a justification for lowering our standards here. MastCell Talk 17:52, 13 May 2011 (UTC)
(Undent) If those who question the "provenance" of the image would say exactly what they want, and say how it might be obtained, then I or someone else could perhaps try to get it. On the other hand, I see that the grounds fir objecting to the image have shifted during this discussion, so perhaps any effort to keep the imagery neutral would be futile. Anythingyouwant ( talk) 12:16, 14 May 2011 (UTC)
To be clear, at present there is absolutely no way that this image meets the standard set forth in Wikipedia:Verifiability: "all material added to articles must be attributable to a reliable, published source appropriate for the content in question". It's obvious to me that anonymous Flickr accounts are not "reliable, published sources" appropriate for controversial medical content. It's an obvious policy violation at present, at least from where I sit.
I suppose if we had some concretely verifiable information about the contributor and the image (e.g. via OTRS) that would help. I personally still wouldn't be comfortable with it, but I wouldn't stand in the way if a consensus of others (ideally without a history of agenda-driven editing on the topic) felt that this was sufficient.
Really, though, I think the time would be better spent finding images that meet the high standard we should be aspiring to, rather than bending over backward to try and keep an image that's going to be borderline even in a very-best-case scenario. I'm going to stop now, and let others chime in since I don't want to beat a dead horse if I'm totally out on a limb here. MastCell Talk 00:02, 15 May 2011 (UTC)
Best point I think that was raised is this is not an image illustrating the concept of a normal 'abortion'. It is, in a round about way, sort of related, but admittedly comes from a very unusual situation. I don't think we need to hide behind the motives. The reason this image was included was because some users felt it was important to illustrate what was being aborted, without necessarily showing gory, shock images found on pro-lifer's signs (and I can't help but think this image isn't much removed from a prior contender, File:Lifesize8weekfetus.JPG). Do we keep the image because we, as a community, think it is important to the topic to show the fetus, even in the context of an unusual hysterectomy? While important, I think the issue of providence is more nitpicky, and skirts this bigger issue. We could probably address those providence concerns with some legwork, but the bigger issue, IMO, would still remain on whether it's appropriate to use a very atypical abortion procedure to illustrate "abortion", and whether the actual motive behind the image, to show a fetus, is still important to the community. - Andrew c [talk] 14:42, 15 May 2011 (UTC)
Hey, all. Making my occasional rounds to the page, thought I'd throw in my two cents. Probably Andrew c is the only one who'd remember me, and, on that subject, why hasn't anyone given him a barnstar since 2007 for his vast and ongoing corpus of work on WP:Abortion? He's richly earned it, but I'm not active enough to give one out. Anyhow, on topic:
It seems to me that the anti-picture faction is putting the pro-picture faction in a Catch-22: it can't be one of those nasty gory pictures from a common abortion, because that's offensive, but it also must be representative of common abortions, so it can't be from rare procedures like a hysterectomy abortion. Here is the trouble: common abortions are gory and visually offensive. Inescapable fact of abortion. I sympathize with both "horns" of the dilemma, but we have to pick a value here: do we prioritize representativity (a word I just invented) or do we favor sensitivity?
Throwing up our hands in disgust and scrubbing all fetal photographs from the article is not an acceptable answer, because such a deliberate, permanent erasure of any touchstone between abortion and its concrete, definitional result deeply compromises the article's encyclopedicity (another word I just invented). Wikipedia, above all other encyclopedias anywhere in history, has insisted on the importance of graphic photography, and has, at times, walked right up to the edge of legality with its long-since uncontroversial images of ejaculation and pornography. And some Abortion editors not only refuse to show graphic images of a perfectly legal medical procedure that are highly central to the topic, but define acceptable imagery in such a way that it is impossible to include any direct photography at all, ever? The idea parodies itself.
Where I do sympathize with the anti-imagery brigade is its concern for verifiability and reliable sourcing. I just got finished criticizing an article that cited Yelp! reviews as a valid source; I'm not going to come over here and argue that Flickr is okay (although, as AYW points out, we've got a lot of information about the uploader. We could just contact her and reload it to Wikimedia Commons to make it as verified as most anything else on the Commons). I'll concede, also, that ads by anti-abortion groups are dubious under NPOV. It should be replaced by a better image from a better source. In the meantime, however, it should be restored-until-replaced. It is topic-relevant, is reasonably well-sourced (though not ideally so), a longstanding part of the article, and was pulled down without discussion (much less consensus) by a user (OrangeMarlin) who appears eager to relitigate large portions of the article in order to (forgive me for saying so, OM) push his POV. Those actions have already resulted in an edit war and an article protection by a third-party admin, which I think sufficiently demonstrates that they were undertaken inappropriately.
The TLDR version: put it back up for now and replace it as soon as possible with something better. And never ever ever edit the abortion article without discussing it first! :P Hope my perspective is helpful. -- BCSWowbagger ( talk) 23:43, 15 May 2011 (UTC)
As to Flickr accounts, I doubt I will ever be comfortable with using one to source something like this - how hard do you think it would be for me to create a Flickr account tonight with solid-sounding (self-provided) credentials and start uploading pics and case histories? But like I said, if I'm out on a limb here, I'll register my disagreement and accept consensus.
Finally, at the risk of distracting from more tangible concerns - am I the only one here who is uncomfortable with displaying an image of an aborted fetus with zero indication that the patient consented to its prominent display on a high-traffic page of a top-10 website? If the answer is "yes", I'll shut up about it. MastCell Talk 03:32, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
Not an expert so I can't say if flickr is an ok source for pictures. To me it's about the picture not belonging here. I get the wikipedia is not censored idea, but at the same time isn't wikipedia supposed to stay neutral? There's a lot of things involved in an actual abortion--the woman, her uterus, the embryo, the doctor, the tools, the clinic. Only having a picture of no. 3 seems pretty selective. It basically frames the issue like peta pictures in the article about hotdogs would. You could argue it takes pigs dying to get hotdogs, that's a fact, why hide it? But it's not just facts that matter, it's how they're wrapped too. A slaughterhouse picture might be ok in an article about slaughterhouses, but stick it in the hotdog article and now it's not neutral. There's not being censored and then there's trying to make sure everyone sees The Truth because you think it's important for people to support your cause. Like they say you can't please them all and staying neutral is what we should go for in this case. Friend of the Facts ( talk) 06:02, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
I don't think I was clear with what I wrote before. Basically I wanted to make an analogy with another issue where protesters use pictures to get their message across. Peta and animal rights activists do it and so do prolifers. So a picture of an animal being slaughtered would be ok in the slaughterhouse article because it's relevant and shows what the article is actually about. But the same picture in an article about a meat product wouldn't be appropriate. The only real reason it could be there was because someone thinks it's important to "show the truth" about meat to get people to go vegan or whatever. Or pictures of maimed civilians on the army page trying to convince people to be antiwar. It's the same thing here. Fetus pictures are ok for fetal development articles because they show what those articles are about. But tied to abortion those same pictures create problems. Fetuses are only one of multiple things involved in an abortion surgery, so why pick and choose just them to show? And how many encyclopedias have a fetus picture in their article about abortion? Do we want wikipedia to be marginal because we just go through hoops to suit everyone's agenda and don't focus on what makes a good encyclopedia? I get that there are folks who think that picture shoiuld stay because it either does no harm or makes the article better. But other folks are disagreeing with it being there and when two sides can't see eye to eye about what to do it's probably best to play it safe and do nothing. I'd say it's probably not worth the time looking for the perfect compromise fetus picture when the idea of such a picture in this article isn't really ok to begin with, but other people had different reasons for not wanting the picture from flickr here and I guess they might think differently. But to me it would be like debating whether the hamburger article should have a picture of an electrocuted cow or a cow with its throat cut when it shouldn't have a picture of a slaughtered cow at all. And I wouldn't call this the "meat" of all the objections (though given the analogy you can call it the meat objection) because it's my own personal reason and so far everyone else has given their own reasons which are different from mine. Also if what's wanted is to show an abortion in progress isn't that already covered by the diagram of the abortion surgery already there in the article? Friend of the Facts ( talk) 22:03, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
I have been asked:
I do have one specific question, and that's for Gandydancer: you spend a whole paragraph talking about whether it's appropriate for the abortus to be "held in hand". I'm genuinely confused. Are you arguing that it's appropriate or inappropriate? I don't see what would be particularly right or wrong about holding the products of a surgery in hand when taking a picture of it, whether we're talking about abortion or tonsillectomy or amputation. It provides a nice sense of scale, I suppose, but other than that very minor point I really don't follow your argument. Can you elaborate?
I do not agree that the photo should be returned just so new editors to this article can look at it. I am new here and I had no problem finding it. Anythingyouwant, you continue to argue that Wikipedia contains "many" and "hundreds" of articles with similar photos and yet to this time you have produced only one "held-in-hand" photo. You supplied a debridement procedure photo with a hand holding an instrument - as one would expect for a procedure (as in the aspiration drawing for this article). Also note that the debridement photo does not show a chunk of dead tissue held-in-hand or even otherwise. Then you went on to say that the tonsil article has a photo without permission. That was not what I found. I did find a very good infected tonsils photo by (our very own!) Doc James and he noted that he had written permission for his photo.
Another editor states: "Holding a fragile item in hand is quite normal." I have had no luck in getting Anythingyouwant to produce evidence of this statement. Can you back up your statement please? Perhaps it is to be expected for a Flickr photo and it's another good reason that, as MastCell has explained, Flickr is not an appropriate source for a medical article such as this. Gandydancer ( talk) 14:23, 18 May 2011 (UTC)
We're clearly capable of great heights of moral fury when someone adds "lol he is gay" to a BLP, so why is it hard to see the potential for real-life harm here? If you support (or demand) the inclusion of this photo, shouldn't you feel some sort of moral obligation to determine whether the patient knows that their fetus is being used to illustrate our article?
I'm comfortable with images uploaded by our medical contributors because a) they're identifiable by their real names; b) they typically vouch explicitly for patient consent; and c) the images are generally much less emotionally charged for the patient than the one we're discussing. I'm fine with images taken (with appropriate permissions) from medical journals (e.g. the tonsillectomy photo), because there's a clear chain of provenance and medical journals generally demand that authors certify that appropriate human-subjects protections exist. MastCell Talk 16:49, 18 May 2011 (UTC)
Here is the image under discussion. per request of another editor. It was in the article for a long time until recently edit-warred out of the article without consensus. The article is presently frozen due to the edit war. No one has suggested any replacement fir this image, no one has suggested any copyvio, no one has pointed to any inaccuracy or inauthenticity of what's shown in the image, no one has pointed to any legal right of the mother that may have been infringed, the contributor's name and occupation are available, and the caption to the right makes clear that this is not a typical image of an abortus. A majority of commenters at the image-RFC (linked in the FAQ) agreed we should include an image of this sort. Anythingyouwant ( talk) 09:53, 19 May 2011 (UTC)
I'll list the reasons I strongly object to this photo for the abortion article:
DMSBe, I have to admit that my first impulse was to respond to your post saying, "Oh lighten up, I was just joking". But I'm glad that I took a little time to think about what you said and I realize how insensitive I have been. I was aware that many people look at a photo of a fetus and see it as "a baby - but smaller" for lack of better wording. But I had forgotten that they may see a photo that does not yet look human in the same way: a complete human being. I hope you will accept my apology as I was not trying to be provocative, I was just being thoughtless and I will be more careful in the future. Gandydancer ( talk) 20:31, 21 May 2011 (UTC)
I'm not even going to get into a huge debate about this; I'll state that now, seeing as I know how heated the topics at this article can get and I am not fond of repeating myself over and over again. But as this is the Abortion article, I feel that a picture of an aborted embryo or fetus, or both, should be in this article. Whether in the lead or lower body of the article. And I cannot be convinced otherwise on that. No agenda. No passionate feeling either way. Just what I feel is common sense. People feeling justified that abortion is wrong by seeing the images or people not wanting the images seen to help advance their pro-choice stance are not valid reasons for censorship, seeing as Wikipedia is not censored. Flyer22 ( talk) 06:32, 24 May 2011 (UTC)
When I talk about "serious, respectable reference works", I'm talking about things like Encyclopedia Britannica, or MedlinePlus, or medical textbooks. It is a foundational principle of this project that we're trying to produce a serious, respectable reference work. Therefore, when we have a dispute, it makes sense to look at how other established reference works present a topic. We don't have to slavishly mirror their coverage, but if we want to depart from what seems to be a universal practice among serious reference works, then we should have a good rationale. I mean, something better than " penis pics!" or " WP:NOTCENSORED!", which is basically focusing on the trees and ignoring the forest.
Atlases of human anatomy are certainly not "censored", so how do they illustrate abortion? When I look online at Netter's Atlas, the lone image of therapeutic abortion I find is this one. Notice that a) it depicts a medical, rather than surgical abortion, and b) note the depiction of the embryo. That diagram is what we should aim for - it's instructive rather than gratuitously graphic. MastCell Talk 17:40, 24 May 2011 (UTC)
While it may be true that none of the aforementioned medical articles or medical texts carry a picture of an abortus (I cannot vouch for every medical text), the argument does not really have weight, except in a article that is purely medical. The abortion article is much wider than that, it is also wider than induced abortion, and so specifically what would be or is included in medical articles does not restrict us here except in regard to the medical aspect of the article which should be illustrated appropriately and without violating Wikipedia's principles. The issue of whether to include a picture of a foetus is not one that can be addressed merely by reference to other medical works/articles, or even other encyclopedias. Neither can be invoked as an absolute rule to determine what we include here. By and large when the subject of an article is narrow in scope, I think it is good to try and maintain the scholarly manner/tone of respected reference works within the same field. So in a purely medical article a diagram might suffice. Obviously pertinent to the discussion is whether the picture used is of a embryo/foetus or an abortus. Given the scope of the article I think a picture of a foetus should be part of it. DMSBel ( talk) 20:12, 25 May 2011 (UTC)
I think a diagram of common methods of induced abortion is appropriate - we have one of vacuum aspiration, and we could add one of medical abortion (along the lines of the Netter diagram that I linked). These have the advantage of being serious, informative, clinical, accurate, and in line with how this subject is generally treated by serious, reputable reference works. I think they are more likely to inform the reader, and less likely to immediately suggest that we're trying to shock and/or censor. MastCell Talk 17:24, 26 May 2011 (UTC)
{{
cite journal}}
: Unknown parameter |month=
ignored (
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was invoked but never defined (see the
help page).This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 35 | ← | Archive 39 | Archive 40 | Archive 41 | Archive 42 | Archive 43 | → | Archive 45 |
It was recently published that in New York City, 40% of pregnancies are terminated by abortion. I have been unable to track down the source of this data, and more importantly how many of these abortions were surgical and how many were chemically induced. I believe this would be useful information to include as a statistic for all of the United States as well as in specific areas such as large cities (NYC, etc..) and rural areas —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.2.238.74 ( talk) 05:11, 22 January 2011 (UTC)
Year | Number of reported abortions | % medical abortions | reference |
---|---|---|---|
1995 | 697,990 | ??? | [1] |
1996 | 725,403 | ??? | [2] |
1997 | 743,618 | 0.4% | [3] |
1998 | 727,666 | 0.7% | [4] |
1999 | 698,136 | 0.9% | [5] |
2000 | 685,834 | 1.0% | [6] |
2001 | 703,839 | 2.9% | [7] |
2002 | 700,615 | 5.2% | [8] |
2003 | 699,548 | 7.9% | [9] |
2004 | 689,084 | 9.6% | [10] |
2005 | 668,662 | 9.9% | [11] |
2006 | 688,859 | 10.5% | [12] |
Shouldn't there be something about the Philadelphia murder case and Kermit Gosnell? Rspyker ( talk) 16:51, 22 January 2011 (UTC)
I ran across this article and thought it may be helpful. [13] WikiManOne ( talk) 07:00, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
Germany has abortion on choice in the first trimester (2nd and 3rd: illegal except for mothers health or life in danger). The map should be changed accordingly. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.158.178.31 ( talk) 00:57, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
Ref #76 in this revision: Web of Trust scores it as a very untrustworthy site. Is that true, and if so, can we replace it somehow? NW ( Talk) 05:39, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
In this edit (without an edit summary), Ritterhude ( talk · contribs) introduced a novel piece of text based on a single recent primary study. I reverted it with the edit summary Reverted good faith edits by Ritterhude (talk); Section is a summary of Abortion and mental health and explained to him on his talk page that this section of the article is a summary of Abortion and mental health, pointing out the {{ main}} template. He has now re-inserted the text with the edit summary Recent research reflecting current scientific thinking, especially if briefly summarized, is always appropriate. The main article is arranged for long discursive sections per study.
I believe the text inserted:
I am therefore seeking consensus to remove the paragraph in question. I'd be quite happy to see discourse at Abortion and mental health about reasons why a primary source that is unsupported by any secondary might be used, but here it completely fails WP:UNDUE. Thoughts? -- RexxS ( talk) 20:42, 29 January 2011 (UTC)
Just a grammatical change to the sentence: "As Wicklund crisscrosses the West to provide abortion services to remote clinics, she tells the stories of women she's treated and the sacrifices herself and her loved ones made." Change "herself" to "she", the correct pronoun. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.231.169.46 ( talk) 05:48, 24 February 2011 (UTC)
Anyone know what happened to the image discussion, I haven't been at the page for a over a week. Is it archived? Closed? What was the result? DMSBel ( talk) 16:27, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
Ok I see it is archived in archive 40. How come? It was on this page for months. Who archived it? It was a live discussion, and now it is just swept away with no indication (that I can see at least) or reason given for archiving it. I'd like to assume there is a good reason for it being archived, but I'd as soon hear what that reason was. DMSBel ( talk) 16:46, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
But this page is currently the second hit on Google on a search for 'murder'. See this screencap [14]. Anyone know why? The word 'murder' is used here, but not prominently. I suppose it's probably just a Google bomb. Robofish ( talk) 16:29, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
I firmly believe nothing should be done to the article itself to affect this, whether it be removing content, quotations, etc. Reacting to such things by altering our content gives power to the creators of Google bombs and sends a message that they can have a wide effect. Kansan ( talk) 22:18, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
Just a minor move so that the picture of the 10 week old fetus is beside the relevant text. It had been beside spontaneous abortion (ie. miscarriage) but that's not what the picture is of. It is corresponding to theraputic abortion. If reverting please discuss here. DMSBel ( talk) 22:36, 27 February 2011 (UTC)
This article is heavy on debunking notions that abortion has adverse effects on women, but is light on the effects that abortion has on the embryo or fetus. I think this article should say more about what abortion does, and not just what it doesn't do. It's not enough to just say that an abortion causes the death of an embryo or fetus. It would be much more informative to say, for example, that an abortion after X weeks stops a beating heart, an abortion after Y weeks stops a fetus that has started to move its head and limbs, an abortion after Z weeks ends a life that stood a better than even chance of surviving to birth, an abortion after P weeks ends the life of a being in which all major human organs exist, et cetera. These are some of the developmental milestones that various legislatures, civilizations, ethicists, and/or pregnant women have deemed to be possibly significant with regard to the morality of abortion.
Now, one could respond by saying that a reader of Wikipedia could easily just go to the articles about the fetus or embryo to find out about these characteristics, but that's incorrect. Those articles do not attempt to single out characteristics relevant to abortion, and indeed there are many aspects of prenatal development that have significance for reasons completely unrelated to abortion. Any thoughts about whether this article should try to do better in this regard? There is a vast literature about the possible moral implications of aborting at various different times in pregnancy, and yet this Wikipedia article mentions none of it. Anythingyouwant ( talk) 22:39, 21 February 2011 (UTC)
For starters, can we insert the following into this article?
“ | The death of an embryo or fetus has different aspects depending on when during pregnancy it occurs, and these developmental milestones sometimes influence the decision whether to perform, permit, or obtain an abortion. For example, an abortion after about five months of pregnancy destroys a "viable" fetus that possibly could have survived a premature birth with modern medical technology. | ” |
This would be a good start. An article like this ought to mention viability. Anythingyouwant ( talk) 13:41, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
I think the thing is that this article basically discusses abortion from a medical point of view. The societal stuff is mostly split into separate articles. You aren't going to find MEDRS-compliant sources talking about how "abortion stops a beating heart!!!1!!one!" because the MEDRS sources on prenatal development don't tend to make it all about abortion. That's why I think this sort of thing belongs in the Abortion debate article. Roscelese ( talk ⋅ contribs) 06:40, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
Does anyone object to the addition of a tag:
This article may be weighted too heavily toward only one aspect of its subject. |
per current discussion? DMSBel ( talk) 13:15, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
1. Wikipedia Elective surgery states: "Elective surgery is surgery that is scheduled in advance because it does not involve a medical emergency. Semi-elective surgery is a surgery that must be done to preserve the patient's life, but does not need to be performed immediately."
2. Medicinenet.com defines the term Elective surgery as follows: "Surgery that is subject to choice (election)...As opposed to urgent or emergency surgery." [ [15]]
3. Medicinenet.com defines the term Elective as follows: "In medicine, something chosen (elected). An elective procedure is one that is chosen (elected) by the patient or physician that is advantageous to the patient but is not urgent. Elective surgery is decided by the patient or their doctor. The procedure is seen as beneficial but not absolutely essential at that time." [ [16]]
4. Wikipedia Surgery states: "Types of surgery: Surgical procedures are the commonly categorized by urgency, type of procedure, body system involved, degree of invasiveness, and special instrumentation. Based on timing: Elective surgery is done to correct a non-life-threatening condition, and is carried out at the patient's request, subject to the surgeon's and the surgical facility's availability. Emergency surgery is surgery which must be done promptly to save life, limb, or functional capacity. A semi-elective surgery is one that must be done to avoid permanent disability or death, but can be postponed for a short time. Based on purpose: Exploratory surgery is performed to aid or confirm a diagnosis. Therapeutic surgery treats a previously diagnosed condition."
Thus a reasonable person would conclude that non-emergency therapeutic surgery is a subcategory of elective surgery. Nearly all surgical abortions are NOT emergency procedures (in other words, they are scheduled procedures and are not medical emergencies).
It seems that this Abortion article's inartful use of the terms "elective" and "therapeutic" confuses the reader rather than clarifying important distinctions. One would use "elective" to describe a procedure based on the timing of the surgery. One would use the term "therapeutic" to describe a procedure based on whether there has been a diagnosis. The 2 terms are not mutually exclusive.
If the terms "elective" and "therapeutic" are to be applied consistently (with no politically correct definitions for procedures performed on pregnant women), then virtually all therapeutic abortions are also elective procedures. Practically speaking, in nearly all modern situataions the 2 terms will be mutually inclusive because modern medicine considers the satisfaction of any woman's desire to no longer be pregnant (regardless of the reason why she no longer wants to be pregnant) as "therapeutic", and abortion is virtually NEVER performed under emergency conditions (in other words: there are virtually no occurences in which an abortion must be done immediately to avoid a serious health risk).
The current section of this article called "Induced" [ [17]] contains a false dichotomy when it states: "Reasons for procuring induced abortions are typically characterized as either therapeutic or elective. An abortion is medically referred to as a therapeutic abortion when it is performed to: ... An abortion is referred to as elective when it is performed at the request of the woman "for reasons other than maternal health or fetal disease.".
This false dichotomy should be corrected by helping the reader understand that the 2 terms therapeutic and elective are virtually synonymous, rather than leading the reader to incorrectly think that an abortion is EITHER elective OR therapeutic. Rarely will any therapeutic abortion not also be elective.
Finally, using the term "therapeutic" also implies that the condition of being pregnant is a disease or a health defect, when in reality, absent any political use of medical terminology, pregnancy is a sign of a healthy reproductive system and is never a disease. There are extremely rare occassions when organs of or near the reproductive tract are diseased and an abortion could thus be therepeutic to the gravid woman (though fatal to the fetus).
Perhaps this wording would address these concerns:
An induced abortion is almost always both elective and therapeutic, meaning that it is a non-emergency surgery performed based on a prior diagnosis. Induced abortions are performed for various reasons, including:
^ source: [ [18]] (Findings from 32 studies in 27 countries were used to examine the reasons that women give for having an abortion... Worldwide, the most commonly reported reason women cite for having an abortion is to postpone or stop childbearing. The second most common reason—socioeconomic concerns—includes disruption of education or employment; lack of support from the father; desire to provide schooling for existing children; and poverty, unemployment or inability to afford additional children. In addition, relationship problems with a husband or partner and a woman's perception that she is too young constitute other important categories of reasons.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.233.18.28 ( talk) 21:37, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
You have both possibly not carefully digested my entire original comments. Item #4 in the original comment quotes wikipedia's own general explanation for when a surgical procedure is called "therapeutic". I am simply advocating that the use of terminology in the abortion article be consistent with the terminology used in the surgery article (which accurateluy uses the term therapeutic). The term therapeutic" does NOT mean "to preserve the life or health of the mother", and the abortion article should not use it or define it in such a way.
With regard to pregnancy, a "diagnosis" is actually a determiniation of the cause of a deviation from homeostasis [see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical_diagnosis#Diagnosis_in_medical_practice] or of a "medical condition" [see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disease#Medical_condition], so I wouldn't avoid that word "diagnosis".
I do not think the word "therapeutic" is helpful to the abortion article, but I have presumed that people will not want to eliminate the word from the article. My proposed language is certainly sourced and is not original research.
Also, there is no need for the AGI source article to mention the two words (elective or therapeutic) as the article is referenced for the REASONS women choose to have an INDUCED abortion, which is the very subheading (Induced) of the abortion article content we are discussing.
The main reality that the article should elucidate is that virtually all induced abortions are "elective" (meaning they can be scheduled a day or a week out without any harm to the gravid female's health), and virtually all induced abortions are therapeutic (meaning they come after a diagnosis). Barring the very rare (almost unheard of) exception, induced abortions are always elective and therapeutic.
The article as it appears now contains a confusing and imprecise and inaccurate discussion of the terms "elective" and "therepeutic". The artcle as it appears now contains an inaccurate conflation of the term "therapeutic" (inaccurately defined as non-elective) with a list of reasons a woman might have an elective abortion, and a false conclusion that other reasons would make it a non-therapeutic elective abortion. The article contains false information now that appears geared toward convincing the reader that abortions are most often "therapeutic" (with accompanying langauge that implies a therapeutic abortion is medically necessary) and that abortions are not very often elective. But the research (the most comprehensive of which was commissioned by and is propagated by abortion advocacy group AGI) comes hands down against that conclusion.
I have revised the suggested NEW wording:
An induced abortion is almost always both elective (a non-emergency procedure) and therapeutic (scheduled after a diagnosis of pregnancy). Induced abortions are performed for various reasons, including:
67.233.18.28 ( talk) 18:32, 3 March 2011 (UTC)
The MedTerms.com definition for "therapeutic abortion" at
[19] is "An abortion that is brought about intentionally," which comports with the general definition of the word "therapeutic" (related to a treatment after diagnosis of a medical condition).
The American Heritage dictonary [20] defines "therapeutic abortion" as
The Gale Encyclopedia of Medicine [21] defines therapeutic abortion as "the intentional termination of a pregnancy before the fetus can live independently". This definition comports with the language I am suggesting because the term is independent of any serious medical threat to the mother's health (although this definition is also problematic because in practice there are medical doctors in good standing who will induce fetal demise of a fetus that is capable of living independently, and there are laws that protect such abortions).
The wikipedia article for therapeutic abortion is likewise poorly written and inaccurate in that it ascribes a colloquial meaning to a medical term, when there is no evidence that the term "therapeutic abortion" is even used colloquially. That article avoids any mention of the actual medical term of art, when that is the most common and rational starting point for an article about that term. "Therapeutic abortion" seems to be a term that is most often used incorrectly by abortion advocates in an effort to paint most abortions as medically neccessary, when the bulk of research and testimony confirms that abortion is almost never medically necessary. But wikipedia should not propagate such usage when the definition for the medical term can so easily and readily be confirmed.
In any event, the scholarly article at this link [22] asserts that "Most providers consider all terminations to be elective, or a voluntary decision made by the patient herself." This assertion supports my suggestion that the wikpedia main article convey to the reader that most typically, an abortion is elective, and that because the termination of any unwanted pregnancy is de facto deemed to be "therapeutic", therefore all abortions are both elective and therapeutic. The only exceptions are the very rare cases when a pregnancy actually threatens a woman's life.
Here is yet another revision of the suggested NEW wording:
An induced abortion is almost always both elective (a non-emergency procedure) and therapeutic (scheduled after a diagnosis). Induced abortions are performed for various reasons, including:
76.2.124.88 ( talk) 18:21, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
What is there now in this "Induced" section of the article is terrible. As it stands, it is a mish-mash admixture conflation that needs to be fixed if readers are to actually benefit from the section. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.3.237.145 ( talk) 01:33, 6 March 2011 (UTC)
Under unsafe abortion there is currently this sentence, sourced to a NY Times article:
"however, generally equating "safe" abortion to "legal" abortion is controversial."
But the NY Times article doesn't say this. It makes it clear that the study's findings were conclusive, not ambiguous, when it comes to the connection between legal status and safety:
"Moreover, the researchers found that abortion was safe in countries where it is legal, but dangerous in countries where it was outlawed and performed clandestinely."
"But the legal status of abortion did greatly affect the dangers involved, researchers said. 'Generally, where abortion is legal it will be provided in a safe manner,' Dr. Van Look said. 'And the opposite is also true: where it is illegal, it is likely to be unsafe, performed under unsafe conditions by poorly trained providers.'"
The only mention of any kind of dispute over the study's findings is this:
"Anti-abortion groups criticized the research, saying that the scientists had jumped to conclusions from imperfect tallies, often estimates of abortion rates in countries where abortion is illegal. 'These numbers are not definitive and very susceptible to interpretation according to the agenda of the people who are organizing the data,' said Randall K. O'Bannon, director of education and research at the National Right to Life Educational Trust Fund in Washington.
He said that the major reason women die in the developing world is that hospitals and health systems lack good doctors and medicines. 'They have equated the word 'safe' with 'legal' and 'unsafe' with 'illegal,' which gives you the illusion that to deal with serious medical system problems you just make abortion illegal,' he said."
This isn't a "controversy." It's one person's unqualifed personal assessment of a World Health Organization study. This personal assessment certainly shouldn't be given the kind of weight it's being given in the article now. Reddestrose ( talk) 07:07, 6 March 2011 (UTC)
I looked at the two sources mentioned, and now I see the problem runs deeper. The first is over 50 years old, the second nearly 20. Both focus on the impact of illegal abortion in the US (the first mainly, the second exclusively). Why rely on outdated and localized sources when the 2007 Lancet study is recent and global? Reddestrose ( talk) 20:23, 6 March 2011 (UTC)
Looking at the article history I see the first sentence of unsafe abortion was changed yesterday. The first sentence originally read:
"One of the main determinants of the availability of safe abortions is the legality of the procedure."
This sentence should be restored, sourced to the 2007 Lancet study. It reflects current scientific understanding. The sentence in the article now is based on outdated sources - one of them over half a century old. Reddestrose ( talk) 22:59, 6 March 2011 (UTC)
The NY Times article (and thus the 2007 Lancet study) is not being used to support the part about the impact of legal status on safety, rather it's being used to support the part about "controversy." The part about the impact of legal status on safety is based on two outdated sources, one 51 years old. Not to mention that it's original research to present data specific to one country (America) as representative of the entire world. So the current sentence in the article presents outdated data as current and localized data as global. This is an inaccurate and needs to be changed. Reddestrose ( talk) 03:16, 7 March 2011 (UTC)
There has been considerable coverage in the news over recent years on the issue of forced abortion. The article does not refer to this at all. See [23], [24], [25], [26], [27]. DMSBel ( talk) 19:04, 9 March 2011 (UTC)
According to the very top of this talk page, it appears the rules at this article have just changed considerably. One would have thought that the relevant discussion would have been mentioned here before the decision was made. Anythingyouwant ( talk) 22:49, 26 February 2011 (UTC)
At the top of the article there is currently a notice which says:
"This article is weighted too heavily toward only one aspect of its subject."
All the major aspects are covered: medicine, law, history, debate, culture. Some areas may need to be expanded, but I don't think any particular aspect's coverage is disproportionate enough to warrant this notice. Reddestrose ( talk) 23:32, 6 March 2011 (UTC)
(Undent) Just a brief note about the recent tagging of the article. While I do believe that this article is slanted, biased, and incomplete for various reasons that I've mentioned above and previously, I have tried to tackle the issues one by one, which is time-consuming because a lot of research is necessarily involved. My time is limited. As I said above, "When time permits, I'll look at what reliable sources have to say on this subject, and then report back here." While I think tagging this article would be helpful to readers, tagging would probably not be successful without ongoing attempts to hash out the problems. I don't have time to do that at the moment, and that's why I haven't tried to tag the article. Anythingyouwant ( talk) 15:32, 10 March 2011 (UTC)
1. Wikipedia Elective surgery states: "Elective surgery is surgery that is scheduled in advance because it does not involve a medical emergency. Semi-elective surgery is a surgery that must be done to preserve the patient's life, but does not need to be performed immediately."
2. Medicinenet.com defines the term Elective surgery as follows: "Surgery that is subject to choice (election)...As opposed to urgent or emergency surgery." [ [31]]
3. Medicinenet.com defines the term Elective as follows: "In medicine, something chosen (elected). An elective procedure is one that is chosen (elected) by the patient or physician that is advantageous to the patient but is not urgent. Elective surgery is decided by the patient or their doctor. The procedure is seen as beneficial but not absolutely essential at that time." [ [32]]
4. Wikipedia Surgery states: "Types of surgery: Surgical procedures are the commonly categorized by urgency, type of procedure, body system involved, degree of invasiveness, and special instrumentation. Based on timing: Elective surgery is done to correct a non-life-threatening condition, and is carried out at the patient's request, subject to the surgeon's and the surgical facility's availability. Emergency surgery is surgery which must be done promptly to save life, limb, or functional capacity. A semi-elective surgery is one that must be done to avoid permanent disability or death, but can be postponed for a short time. Based on purpose: Exploratory surgery is performed to aid or confirm a diagnosis. Therapeutic surgery treats a previously diagnosed condition."
Thus a reasonable person would conclude that non-emergency therapeutic surgery is a subcategory of elective surgery. Nearly all surgical abortions are NOT emergency procedures (in other words, they are scheduled procedures and are not medical emergencies).
It seems that this Abortion article's inartful use of the terms "elective" and "therapeutic" confuses the reader rather than clarifying important distinctions. One would use "elective" to describe a procedure based on the timing of the surgery. One would use the term "therapeutic" to describe a procedure based on whether there has been a diagnosis. The 2 terms are not mutually exclusive.
If the terms "elective" and "therapeutic" are to be applied consistently (with no politically correct definitions for procedures performed on pregnant women), then virtually all therapeutic abortions are also elective procedures. Practically speaking, in nearly all modern situataions the 2 terms will be mutually inclusive because modern medicine considers the satisfaction of any woman's desire to no longer be pregnant (regardless of the reason why she no longer wants to be pregnant) as "therapeutic", and abortion is virtually NEVER performed under emergency conditions (in other words: there are virtually no occurences in which an abortion must be done immediately to avoid a serious health risk).
The current section of this article called "Induced" [ [33]] contains a false dichotomy when it states: "Reasons for procuring induced abortions are typically characterized as either therapeutic or elective. An abortion is medically referred to as a therapeutic abortion when it is performed to: ... An abortion is referred to as elective when it is performed at the request of the woman "for reasons other than maternal health or fetal disease.".
This false dichotomy should be corrected by helping the reader understand that the 2 terms therapeutic and elective are virtually synonymous, rather than leading the reader to incorrectly think that an abortion is EITHER elective OR therapeutic. Rarely will any therapeutic abortion not also be elective.
Finally, using the term "therapeutic" also implies that the condition of being pregnant is a disease or a health defect, when in reality, absent any political use of medical terminology, pregnancy is a sign of a healthy reproductive system and is never a disease. There are extremely rare occassions when organs of or near the reproductive tract are diseased and an abortion could thus be therepeutic to the gravid woman (though fatal to the fetus).
Perhaps this wording would address these concerns:
An induced abortion is almost always both elective and therapeutic, meaning that it is a non-emergency surgery performed based on a prior diagnosis. Induced abortions are performed for various reasons, including:
^ source: [ [34]] (Findings from 32 studies in 27 countries were used to examine the reasons that women give for having an abortion... Worldwide, the most commonly reported reason women cite for having an abortion is to postpone or stop childbearing. The second most common reason—socioeconomic concerns—includes disruption of education or employment; lack of support from the father; desire to provide schooling for existing children; and poverty, unemployment or inability to afford additional children. In addition, relationship problems with a husband or partner and a woman's perception that she is too young constitute other important categories of reasons.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.233.18.28 ( talk) 21:37, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
You have both possibly not carefully digested my entire original comments. Item #4 in the original comment quotes wikipedia's own general explanation for when a surgical procedure is called "therapeutic". I am simply advocating that the use of terminology in the abortion article be consistent with the terminology used in the surgery article (which accurateluy uses the term therapeutic). The term therapeutic" does NOT mean "to preserve the life or health of the mother", and the abortion article should not use it or define it in such a way.
With regard to pregnancy, a "diagnosis" is actually a determiniation of the cause of a deviation from homeostasis [see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical_diagnosis#Diagnosis_in_medical_practice] or of a "medical condition" [see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disease#Medical_condition], so I wouldn't avoid that word "diagnosis".
I do not think the word "therapeutic" is helpful to the abortion article, but I have presumed that people will not want to eliminate the word from the article. My proposed language is certainly sourced and is not original research.
Also, there is no need for the AGI source article to mention the two words (elective or therapeutic) as the article is referenced for the REASONS women choose to have an INDUCED abortion, which is the very subheading (Induced) of the abortion article content we are discussing.
The main reality that the article should elucidate is that virtually all induced abortions are "elective" (meaning they can be scheduled a day or a week out without any harm to the gravid female's health), and virtually all induced abortions are therapeutic (meaning they come after a diagnosis). Barring the very rare (almost unheard of) exception, induced abortions are always elective and therapeutic.
The article as it appears now contains a confusing and imprecise and inaccurate discussion of the terms "elective" and "therepeutic". The artcle as it appears now contains an inaccurate conflation of the term "therapeutic" (inaccurately defined as non-elective) with a list of reasons a woman might have an elective abortion, and a false conclusion that other reasons would make it a non-therapeutic elective abortion. The article contains false information now that appears geared toward convincing the reader that abortions are most often "therapeutic" (with accompanying langauge that implies a therapeutic abortion is medically necessary) and that abortions are not very often elective. But the research (the most comprehensive of which was commissioned by and is propagated by abortion advocacy group AGI) comes hands down against that conclusion.
I have revised the suggested NEW wording:
An induced abortion is almost always both elective (a non-emergency procedure) and therapeutic (scheduled after a diagnosis of pregnancy). Induced abortions are performed for various reasons, including:
67.233.18.28 ( talk) 18:32, 3 March 2011 (UTC)
The MedTerms.com definition for "therapeutic abortion" at
[35] is "An abortion that is brought about intentionally," which comports with the general definition of the word "therapeutic" (related to a treatment after diagnosis of a medical condition).
The American Heritage dictonary [36] defines "therapeutic abortion" as
The Gale Encyclopedia of Medicine [37] defines therapeutic abortion as "the intentional termination of a pregnancy before the fetus can live independently". This definition comports with the language I am suggesting because the term is independent of any serious medical threat to the mother's health (although this definition is also problematic because in practice there are medical doctors in good standing who will induce fetal demise of a fetus that is capable of living independently, and there are laws that protect such abortions).
The wikipedia article for therapeutic abortion is likewise poorly written and inaccurate in that it ascribes a colloquial meaning to a medical term, when there is no evidence that the term "therapeutic abortion" is even used colloquially. That article avoids any mention of the actual medical term of art, when that is the most common and rational starting point for an article about that term. "Therapeutic abortion" seems to be a term that is most often used incorrectly by abortion advocates in an effort to paint most abortions as medically neccessary, when the bulk of research and testimony confirms that abortion is almost never medically necessary. But wikipedia should not propagate such usage when the definition for the medical term can so easily and readily be confirmed.
In any event, the scholarly article at this link [38] asserts that "Most providers consider all terminations to be elective, or a voluntary decision made by the patient herself." This assertion supports my suggestion that the wikpedia main article convey to the reader that most typically, an abortion is elective, and that because the termination of any unwanted pregnancy is de facto deemed to be "therapeutic", therefore all abortions are both elective and therapeutic. The only exceptions are the very rare cases when a pregnancy actually threatens a woman's life.
Here is yet another revision of the suggested NEW wording:
An induced abortion is almost always both elective (a non-emergency procedure) and therapeutic (scheduled after a diagnosis). Induced abortions are performed for various reasons, including:
76.2.124.88 ( talk) 18:21, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
What is there now in this "Induced" section of the article is terrible. As it stands, it is a mish-mash admixture conflation that needs to be fixed if readers are to actually benefit from the section. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.3.237.145 ( talk) 01:33, 6 March 2011 (UTC)
The very first paragraph and it contains misleading and inaccurate information: "In the context of human pregnancies, an abortion induced to preserve the health of the gravida (pregnant female) is termed a therapeutic abortion, while an abortion induced for any other reason is termed an elective abortion."
This sentence falsely represents what a therpaeutic abortion is. Most therapeutic abortions are NOT performed because there is a risk to the gravid woman's health. Virtually all therapeutic abortions are also ELECTIVE (i.e. "non-emergency"). The current language in the article skews these facts. 67.233.18.28 ( talk) 21:53, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
Apparently this concern over the misuse of the word "therapeutic" in this article is being ignored because you folks can't think of any good reasons not to edit the article in to account for the problem that has been highlighted. Or perhaps one of you can fix the article. I won't register because wikipedia's freezing policy is biased and hypocritical, which means I can't edit the article - but that does not mean I can't point out the blatant error this article contains.
67.233.18.28 (
talk) —Preceding
undated comment added 21:29, 6 April 2011 (UTC).
How sad that no editors will even seriously discuss these legitimate criticims. Having the article locked is ridiculous. —Preceding
unsigned comment added by
71.3.237.145 (
talk) 02:04, 26 April 2011 (UTC)
I overhauled this section. It seems best to start out with a definition. Anythingyouwant ( talk) 03:46, 18 March 2011 (UTC)
More to the point, these are sources that you've selected. It's not clear why you've selected these, in preference to the existing high-quality, up-to-date sources that you've downplayed. You're using these new sources to replace conclusions from the previously existing sources, but that's not an appropriate use of these sources. They don't "rebut" the existing sources, and it's an artificial editorialization to use them that way. We should be synthesizing these sources, if anything, rather than cherry-picking them. MastCell Talk 05:01, 18 March 2011 (UTC)
I'm not sure I see a big shift in the meaning of the article between the versions, but I must comment that the tone above seems rather more heated than necessary. The rush of wp:BOLD edits by Anythingyouwant was perhaps precipitous, but the breadth of MastCell's reversion was not helpful either. May I suggest that we agree to go back to the version prior to MastCell's reversion then look one at a time at the preceding edits (in reverse time order) to discuss if they should stand or be reverted? Then when that's finished, we can get on with the fixing details in the resultant mix (such as the citation formats). At the moment fixing those would only complicate matters. LeadSongDog come howl! 15:55, 18 March 2011 (UTC)
To the extent that undue frustration has seeped into my comments, it springs from my perception of a focused, long-standing effort to minimize or downplay the link between abortion's legality and its safety, a link that (whatever one's personal opinions on the subject) is acknowledged as central and uncontroversial by all reputable medical and public-health sources. I perceive a long-term effort to obscure the content of these sources where their findings are ideologically objectionable to individual editors; hence the frustration. The best solution is the involvement of additional outside editors; in the meantime, I will endeavor to improve my tone, starting by ignoring the immediately preceding comment. MastCell Talk 16:25, 18 March 2011 (UTC)
1. Ok, so this was the last edit. It clearly is in error, attributing present tense to a 2005 document. Ultimately this would better have read "as of ... was". If we can agree on that, I'll revert for now and add that to a list of changes to make later. LeadSongDog come howl! 17:34, 18 March 2011 (UTC)
2. The edit before that was this one. It did two things. Naming a reference to Blas p.182 for an existing statement that cites it would be uncontentious, but also citing it while replacing "where health care is at a generally low level" with "where affordable well-trained medical practitioners are not readily available" when neither statement is truly supported by the reference here, at least not on the cited page 259. Perhaps a more judicious reading of the source(s) would help with this edit. LeadSongDog come howl! 19:04, 18 March 2011 (UTC)
The principal social determinant of recourse to unsafe abortion is real or perceived legal restriction on safe abortion. Developing countries are much more likely to restrict access to legal abortion than developed countries, and the restrictions disproportionately affect poorer women. [39]
As to the edit in question, I have a weak preference for the version favored by LeadSongDog, but overall I don't feel strongly that one version is better than the other. Mostly, I think the overall way we present these sources is misleading, but presumably we can address that as we unwind the stack of recent edit a bit further. MastCell Talk 20:36, 18 March 2011 (UTC)
I know it's the weekend, so I'll try to be patient, but I don't see a lot of independent support for enshrining AYW's unilateral and disputed text on this high-profile article, over the pre-existing, relatively stable text (which should really be the starting point, if we were following WP:BRD). I do think more input would help move things forward, so tomorrow I'll probably solicit some from WP:MED or from other editors who have recently been active here. MastCell Talk 18:43, 20 March 2011 (UTC)
(undent) Just as a .02 for glancing at it (never looked at this article before, so I have no idea what the previous version was and I'm going to bed now instead of looking it up), the statements like "Unsafe abortions sometimes occur where abortion is legal, and safe abortions sometimes occur where abortion is illegal" followed by lots of cites (this line is also in the main article with only one citation) seem redundant as it's a level of detail that's best left for the main article. Honestly, I think we should take the lead section for that main article and start from there. More than two paragraphs here is too much when we have an entire article to read. Honestly, I think we could chop out everything but a brief explanation (the current definition and an example adds four lines of text but only ten words of information), two or three of the "big picture" statistics like the 48% and the one-in-eight, and maybe another line or two out of the lead of the main article. The objective is to summarize the main, not have enough information that we start worrying about the two pages disagreeing about it. SDY ( talk) 06:33, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
Unsafe abortion is a public health concern due to the higher incidence and severity of complications, such as incomplete abortion, sepsis, hemorrhage, and damage to internal organs, and the term "unsafe abortion" has a specific definition. An abortion is called "unsafe" if it is by a person without proper medical training, such as the woman herself, or by a qualified person operating in sub-standard conditions. [1]
Restrictive abortion laws are associated with a high rate of unsafe abortions. Worldwide, complications of unsafe abortion cause 13% of all maternal mortalities, and unsafe procedures accounted for 48% of all abortions performed in 2003. [2] [3] [2] [4] [5]
Unsafe abortions are defined as those performed by people lacking proper medical training (including self-induced abortion) or in sub-standard conditions. [1] This is a major public-health concern due to the high incidence and severity of complications, such as incomplete abortion, sepsis, hemorrhage, and damage to internal organs. Restrictive abortion laws are associated with a high rate of unsafe abortions. citation needed Worldwide, complications of unsafe abortion cause 13% of all maternal mortalities, and unsafe procedures accounted for 48% of all abortions performed in 2003. [2] [3] [2] [4] [6]
(Undent) Again, for the umpteenth time, I have no objection to saying that "Restrictive abortion laws are associated with a high rate of unsafe abortions." But I strongly object to omitting that other factors are associated with a high rate of unsafe abortion: namely the unavailability of modern contraceptives, and also the unavailability of affordable skilled practitioners, both of which often occur where abortion is legal as well as where it's illegal. Just consider contraceptives; reliable sources say that if they were available then the number of unsafe abortions would decline by 73% from 20 million to 5.5 million, with no change in abortion laws. [40] Anythingyouwant ( talk) 23:57, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
Developing countries with restrictive abortion laws | Developed countries and developing countries without restrictive abortion laws | |
---|---|---|
Unsafe abortions | 19,600,000 | 400,000 |
Safe abortions | 22,000,000 |
Type and location | Number of abortions |
---|---|
Safe abortions (52%) | 22,000,000
|
Unsafe abortions in developing countries with restrictive abortion laws (47%) | 19,600,000
|
Unsafe abortions in developed countries and developing countries without restrictive abortion laws (1%) | 400,000
|
I'd like to add this to the section on unsafe abortion:
“ | Incidence of unsafe abortion would be reduced by about 73% without any change in abortion laws, if modern contraceptives were made readily available.[1] Rates of unsafe abortion also remain high in some countries where abortion is legal because clinicians are poorly trained or facilities are inadequate.[2] | ” |
[1]Singh, Susheela et al.
Adding it Up: The Costs and Benefits of Investing in Family Planning and Newborn Health (New York: Guttmacher Institute and United Nations Population Fund 2009)
[2]Blas, Erik et al.
Equity, social determinants and public health programmes, pages 182-183 (World Health Organization 2010).
Anythingyouwant (
talk) 00:24, 22 March 2011 (UTC)
(undent) It's more than adequately covered in the main article, frankly. Six of one or half dozen of the other as to leaving it all to the main and/or including several details here. The other question I have is where we should put the unsafe business. I think it flows a lot better if it's included in the safety section. Minor quibbles to text aside, what are the thoughts on the general plan I suggested here. SDY ( talk) 15:02, 22 March 2011 (UTC)
I support insertion of Rexx's suggested sentence: ""Incidence of unsafe abortion could be reduced by as much as 73% without any change in abortion laws, if modern family planning and maternal health services were readily available." Once it is inserted, then I would support putting the word "contraceptive" into the sentence, because that is what the source says. A reason why 73% of unsafe abortion occurs is lack of modern contraceptives, so the 73% figure belongs in this article. Anythingyouwant ( talk) 19:04, 22 March 2011 (UTC)
(undent) I'd prefer to leave it to the main article, especially since the statistic we're talking about is not in that article. If nothing else, anything "new" here must be also added to unsafe abortion, and I'm a little leery of including it as a "super-important part of the summary" when no one has been bothered to even mention it on Wikipedia until now. It's an interesting fact, and certainly relevant to the discussion, but it's largely a question of "now that unsafe abortion exists, what do we do with it?" and that's a question and discussion that's best left to the main article. I would prefer to include here what has been done about it, another topic that's not covered in the main article. The best idea, in my opinion, would be just to steal the following line from the other article's lead: "Most unsafe abortions occur where abortion is illegal,[3] or in developing countries where affordable well-trained medical practitioners are not readily available,[4][5] or where modern contraceptives are unavailable.[6]" SDY ( talk) 01:44, 23 March 2011 (UTC)
We had this
<blockquoteThe legality of abortion is one of the main determinants of its safety. Restrictive abortion laws are associated with a high rate of unsafe abortions.
Changed to this
Unsafe abortions sometimes occur where abortion is legal, and safe abortions sometimes occur where abortion is illegal.
The refs better support the former rather than the latter. Doc James ( talk · contribs · email) 07:03, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
(undent) Technichally, this isn't about abortion safety, this is about a specific technical term ("unsafe abortion") that's designed to capture data about the types of abortions that are performed. We have a section in the article on safety. If the person who is performing an abortion is a badly trained doctor working in a sparsely equipped but functional hospital setting, it's not safe as safe as it should be but the operation does not meet the definition of "unsafe." Contrariwise, an operation performed at home by an excellent doctor with impeccable technique might have very low risks indeed, but it would still meet the definition of "unsafe." Pulling this in, can we remove the link "health risks of unsafe abortion" (redundant) and just call the "health risks" a "complications" section like we do for other surgeries? SDY ( talk) 14:39, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
In several countries, the legalization of abortion has not been followed by elimination of unsafe abortion.; (2) Faúndes, Aníbal and Barzelatto, José. The Human Drama of Abortion: a Global Search for Consensus, page 21 (Vanderbilt University Press 2006); (3) Blas, Erik et al. Equity, social determinants and public health programmes, pages 182-183 (World Health Organization 2010); (4) Safe Abortion: Technical and Policy Guidance for Health Systems, page 15 (World Health Organization 2003).
Regarding deaths from illegal abortion, I agree that these would presumably be relatively rare in a developed country where the complications of unsafe abortion can be treated rapidly and effectively. But death is not the only variable here. Even with good medical care, unsafe abortion can result in uterine scarring, future infertility, hospital stays, increased medical spending, and all of the downstream effects of these non-fatal complications. I don't think we should convey the idea that if unsafe abortions don't outright kill women, then they're no big deal. I don't think that viewpoint is contained in reliable sources, nor does it seem to make much sense. MastCell Talk 17:06, 7 April 2011 (UTC)
This map is better. 188.118.146.242 ( talk) 17:43, 31 March 2011 (UTC)
(undent) again here is the ref for all countries from the UN http://www.un.org/esa/population/publications/abortion/profiles.htm So please just list the countries that are incorrect per the above ref and I am sure they can be quickly fixed. Doc James ( talk · contribs · email) 23:04, 6 May 2011 (UTC)
from above site:
With regard to the countries Anythingyouwant mentioned (Egypt, Iran, Syria, Yemen, Oman, Lebanon, and UAE) these all permit abortion only on ground of risk to life of the woman.
The section therefore should at least be tagged until this is cleared up.
Is there not a basic map with country names somewhere in WP Commons that could be edited to change colours? My geography is not great and it would help checking if the country names were on the map.
DMSBel ( talk) 21:10, 10 May 2011 (UTC)
Which of these tags:
This article may not provide
balanced coverage on a geographical region. |
This section's factual accuracy is
disputed. |
would be best? DMSBel ( talk) 12:26, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
I am a graphics person. I'd be glad to create a new map if it will solve this dispute. Could someone give me concise, yet detailed instructions on what needs to be changed? Is there consensus on that front? If there is, it seems simple enough to just make a new map, and I'd gladly do that. Also, inline dispute tags are better than section tags if the whole section isn't what is in dispute, but instead a single image...- Andrew c [talk] 16:25, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
According to the source used in the article (World Abortion Policies 2007) the following countries only permit abortion on the ground of saving the life of the mother:
Africa: Djibouti, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Somalia, Angola, Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Gabon, São Tomé and Príncipe, Egypt, Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, Lesotho, Côte d'Ivoire, Guinea-Bissau, Mauritania, Niger, Senegal
South-Central Asia: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Iran (Islamic Republic of), Sri Lanka
South-Eastern Asia: Brunei Darussalam, Indonesia, Myanmar, Philippines
Western Asia: Lebanon, Oman, Syrian Arab Republic, United Arab Emirates, Yemen
Europe: Ireland, Andorra, San Marino, Monaco
Caribbean: Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Haiti
Central America: Guatemala, Honduras
South America: Paraguay, Suriname
Melanesia: Solomon Islands
Micronesia: Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Micronesia (Federated States of), Palau
Polynesia: Tonga, Tuvalu
If we just take out the "...and in some countries physical and/or mental health" from the legend (refering here to the map currently in the article, not the one above) it would reduce the amount of changes needed to a minimum. 62.254.133.139 ( talk) 17:17, 12 May 2011 (UTC)
Any objections? DMSBel ( talk) 14:08, 13 May 2011 (UTC)
but it still needs some changes. For instance Spain's abortion legislation has changed, (I had not been aware of this before uploading). Important Please Note if making changes, some previous changes to earlier maps were to change the status of countries from the de jure (legality of abortion) to the de facto (actual practice). This section is on abortion law, not abortion practice, make sure that any changes are representative of the legal status of abortion in the various countries. DMSBel ( talk) 13:42, 14 May 2011 (UTC)
According to the FAQ, "in the first quarter of 2009, various encyclopedic images related to abortions that show an intact embryo and fetus have been introduced to the article". As of today, those images have been completely removed. OrangeMarlin says there's no verification that the image is what the caption says it is. Well, the OB GYN who took the picture in India has stated what it is, and it sure isn't an ice cream cone or a windmill.
In the spirit of "no censorship", maybe it would be better to have an image that actually shows the blood and guts, but this image has been the compromise for years.
OrangeMarlin's edit summary is this: “Absolutely no verification that this is actually a photograph of a 10 week old fetus.” If the objection is the "10 week" figure in the caption, then the caption could have been edited without removing the image. Moreover, the "10 week" figure is attested to by the creator of the image, and it is also confirmed by looking at the size of the fetus in relation to the hand holding it. A fetus at 10 weeks LMP (i.e. 8 weeks after fertilization) has a crown to rump length of 3 centimetres (1.2 in) which is consistent with the image. Anythingyouwant ( talk) 08:49, 12 May 2011 (UTC)
Secondly, removing and photographing the fetus after such an operation is unusual, to say the least. Posting such a photograph on Flickr is perhaps even more unusual. Given the large number of... unusual aspects associated with this photo, I think we should not use it. I'm not personally totally comfortable trusting an anonymous Flickr user's assertions about the photo for our purposes. I doubt that any other serious, respectable reference work (e.g. Britannica) would include a photo with such poorly attested provenance. MastCell Talk 21:36, 12 May 2011 (UTC)
(outdent)Well if we're going for age, I believe I've been here longer than Anythingyouwant; but frankly how long you've been editing any particular article is not generally useful. We don't give points for longevity. OTH, what might be relevant is that Anythingyouwant is still under sanctions for disrupting Arbortion related articles in order to push his POV. See Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Ferrylodge#Ferrylodge restricted. I suggest he back off a little from trying to get another inflammatory image inserted in this article. Had I been paying attention when it was added, I would have said something at the time. KillerChihuahua ?!? Advice 23:26, 12 May 2011 (UTC)
No one has actually addressed my core objection. We know nothing about this photo's provenance beyond what has been provided by an anonymous Flickr user. I think that is far, far below the bar we should aspire to use to illustrate medical articles. Again, no serious, respectable reference work on Earth would use an anonymously uploaded Flickr photo of unknown provenance to illustrate a medical article.
As a secondary concern, the image is in no way typical of therapeutic abortion - in fact, it's extraordinarily atypical. Using it as one of the (relatively few) photos in this article is misleading.
Finally, perhaps we can dispense with arguments that "other crap exists on Wikipedia" as a justification for lowering our standards here. MastCell Talk 17:52, 13 May 2011 (UTC)
(Undent) If those who question the "provenance" of the image would say exactly what they want, and say how it might be obtained, then I or someone else could perhaps try to get it. On the other hand, I see that the grounds fir objecting to the image have shifted during this discussion, so perhaps any effort to keep the imagery neutral would be futile. Anythingyouwant ( talk) 12:16, 14 May 2011 (UTC)
To be clear, at present there is absolutely no way that this image meets the standard set forth in Wikipedia:Verifiability: "all material added to articles must be attributable to a reliable, published source appropriate for the content in question". It's obvious to me that anonymous Flickr accounts are not "reliable, published sources" appropriate for controversial medical content. It's an obvious policy violation at present, at least from where I sit.
I suppose if we had some concretely verifiable information about the contributor and the image (e.g. via OTRS) that would help. I personally still wouldn't be comfortable with it, but I wouldn't stand in the way if a consensus of others (ideally without a history of agenda-driven editing on the topic) felt that this was sufficient.
Really, though, I think the time would be better spent finding images that meet the high standard we should be aspiring to, rather than bending over backward to try and keep an image that's going to be borderline even in a very-best-case scenario. I'm going to stop now, and let others chime in since I don't want to beat a dead horse if I'm totally out on a limb here. MastCell Talk 00:02, 15 May 2011 (UTC)
Best point I think that was raised is this is not an image illustrating the concept of a normal 'abortion'. It is, in a round about way, sort of related, but admittedly comes from a very unusual situation. I don't think we need to hide behind the motives. The reason this image was included was because some users felt it was important to illustrate what was being aborted, without necessarily showing gory, shock images found on pro-lifer's signs (and I can't help but think this image isn't much removed from a prior contender, File:Lifesize8weekfetus.JPG). Do we keep the image because we, as a community, think it is important to the topic to show the fetus, even in the context of an unusual hysterectomy? While important, I think the issue of providence is more nitpicky, and skirts this bigger issue. We could probably address those providence concerns with some legwork, but the bigger issue, IMO, would still remain on whether it's appropriate to use a very atypical abortion procedure to illustrate "abortion", and whether the actual motive behind the image, to show a fetus, is still important to the community. - Andrew c [talk] 14:42, 15 May 2011 (UTC)
Hey, all. Making my occasional rounds to the page, thought I'd throw in my two cents. Probably Andrew c is the only one who'd remember me, and, on that subject, why hasn't anyone given him a barnstar since 2007 for his vast and ongoing corpus of work on WP:Abortion? He's richly earned it, but I'm not active enough to give one out. Anyhow, on topic:
It seems to me that the anti-picture faction is putting the pro-picture faction in a Catch-22: it can't be one of those nasty gory pictures from a common abortion, because that's offensive, but it also must be representative of common abortions, so it can't be from rare procedures like a hysterectomy abortion. Here is the trouble: common abortions are gory and visually offensive. Inescapable fact of abortion. I sympathize with both "horns" of the dilemma, but we have to pick a value here: do we prioritize representativity (a word I just invented) or do we favor sensitivity?
Throwing up our hands in disgust and scrubbing all fetal photographs from the article is not an acceptable answer, because such a deliberate, permanent erasure of any touchstone between abortion and its concrete, definitional result deeply compromises the article's encyclopedicity (another word I just invented). Wikipedia, above all other encyclopedias anywhere in history, has insisted on the importance of graphic photography, and has, at times, walked right up to the edge of legality with its long-since uncontroversial images of ejaculation and pornography. And some Abortion editors not only refuse to show graphic images of a perfectly legal medical procedure that are highly central to the topic, but define acceptable imagery in such a way that it is impossible to include any direct photography at all, ever? The idea parodies itself.
Where I do sympathize with the anti-imagery brigade is its concern for verifiability and reliable sourcing. I just got finished criticizing an article that cited Yelp! reviews as a valid source; I'm not going to come over here and argue that Flickr is okay (although, as AYW points out, we've got a lot of information about the uploader. We could just contact her and reload it to Wikimedia Commons to make it as verified as most anything else on the Commons). I'll concede, also, that ads by anti-abortion groups are dubious under NPOV. It should be replaced by a better image from a better source. In the meantime, however, it should be restored-until-replaced. It is topic-relevant, is reasonably well-sourced (though not ideally so), a longstanding part of the article, and was pulled down without discussion (much less consensus) by a user (OrangeMarlin) who appears eager to relitigate large portions of the article in order to (forgive me for saying so, OM) push his POV. Those actions have already resulted in an edit war and an article protection by a third-party admin, which I think sufficiently demonstrates that they were undertaken inappropriately.
The TLDR version: put it back up for now and replace it as soon as possible with something better. And never ever ever edit the abortion article without discussing it first! :P Hope my perspective is helpful. -- BCSWowbagger ( talk) 23:43, 15 May 2011 (UTC)
As to Flickr accounts, I doubt I will ever be comfortable with using one to source something like this - how hard do you think it would be for me to create a Flickr account tonight with solid-sounding (self-provided) credentials and start uploading pics and case histories? But like I said, if I'm out on a limb here, I'll register my disagreement and accept consensus.
Finally, at the risk of distracting from more tangible concerns - am I the only one here who is uncomfortable with displaying an image of an aborted fetus with zero indication that the patient consented to its prominent display on a high-traffic page of a top-10 website? If the answer is "yes", I'll shut up about it. MastCell Talk 03:32, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
Not an expert so I can't say if flickr is an ok source for pictures. To me it's about the picture not belonging here. I get the wikipedia is not censored idea, but at the same time isn't wikipedia supposed to stay neutral? There's a lot of things involved in an actual abortion--the woman, her uterus, the embryo, the doctor, the tools, the clinic. Only having a picture of no. 3 seems pretty selective. It basically frames the issue like peta pictures in the article about hotdogs would. You could argue it takes pigs dying to get hotdogs, that's a fact, why hide it? But it's not just facts that matter, it's how they're wrapped too. A slaughterhouse picture might be ok in an article about slaughterhouses, but stick it in the hotdog article and now it's not neutral. There's not being censored and then there's trying to make sure everyone sees The Truth because you think it's important for people to support your cause. Like they say you can't please them all and staying neutral is what we should go for in this case. Friend of the Facts ( talk) 06:02, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
I don't think I was clear with what I wrote before. Basically I wanted to make an analogy with another issue where protesters use pictures to get their message across. Peta and animal rights activists do it and so do prolifers. So a picture of an animal being slaughtered would be ok in the slaughterhouse article because it's relevant and shows what the article is actually about. But the same picture in an article about a meat product wouldn't be appropriate. The only real reason it could be there was because someone thinks it's important to "show the truth" about meat to get people to go vegan or whatever. Or pictures of maimed civilians on the army page trying to convince people to be antiwar. It's the same thing here. Fetus pictures are ok for fetal development articles because they show what those articles are about. But tied to abortion those same pictures create problems. Fetuses are only one of multiple things involved in an abortion surgery, so why pick and choose just them to show? And how many encyclopedias have a fetus picture in their article about abortion? Do we want wikipedia to be marginal because we just go through hoops to suit everyone's agenda and don't focus on what makes a good encyclopedia? I get that there are folks who think that picture shoiuld stay because it either does no harm or makes the article better. But other folks are disagreeing with it being there and when two sides can't see eye to eye about what to do it's probably best to play it safe and do nothing. I'd say it's probably not worth the time looking for the perfect compromise fetus picture when the idea of such a picture in this article isn't really ok to begin with, but other people had different reasons for not wanting the picture from flickr here and I guess they might think differently. But to me it would be like debating whether the hamburger article should have a picture of an electrocuted cow or a cow with its throat cut when it shouldn't have a picture of a slaughtered cow at all. And I wouldn't call this the "meat" of all the objections (though given the analogy you can call it the meat objection) because it's my own personal reason and so far everyone else has given their own reasons which are different from mine. Also if what's wanted is to show an abortion in progress isn't that already covered by the diagram of the abortion surgery already there in the article? Friend of the Facts ( talk) 22:03, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
I have been asked:
I do have one specific question, and that's for Gandydancer: you spend a whole paragraph talking about whether it's appropriate for the abortus to be "held in hand". I'm genuinely confused. Are you arguing that it's appropriate or inappropriate? I don't see what would be particularly right or wrong about holding the products of a surgery in hand when taking a picture of it, whether we're talking about abortion or tonsillectomy or amputation. It provides a nice sense of scale, I suppose, but other than that very minor point I really don't follow your argument. Can you elaborate?
I do not agree that the photo should be returned just so new editors to this article can look at it. I am new here and I had no problem finding it. Anythingyouwant, you continue to argue that Wikipedia contains "many" and "hundreds" of articles with similar photos and yet to this time you have produced only one "held-in-hand" photo. You supplied a debridement procedure photo with a hand holding an instrument - as one would expect for a procedure (as in the aspiration drawing for this article). Also note that the debridement photo does not show a chunk of dead tissue held-in-hand or even otherwise. Then you went on to say that the tonsil article has a photo without permission. That was not what I found. I did find a very good infected tonsils photo by (our very own!) Doc James and he noted that he had written permission for his photo.
Another editor states: "Holding a fragile item in hand is quite normal." I have had no luck in getting Anythingyouwant to produce evidence of this statement. Can you back up your statement please? Perhaps it is to be expected for a Flickr photo and it's another good reason that, as MastCell has explained, Flickr is not an appropriate source for a medical article such as this. Gandydancer ( talk) 14:23, 18 May 2011 (UTC)
We're clearly capable of great heights of moral fury when someone adds "lol he is gay" to a BLP, so why is it hard to see the potential for real-life harm here? If you support (or demand) the inclusion of this photo, shouldn't you feel some sort of moral obligation to determine whether the patient knows that their fetus is being used to illustrate our article?
I'm comfortable with images uploaded by our medical contributors because a) they're identifiable by their real names; b) they typically vouch explicitly for patient consent; and c) the images are generally much less emotionally charged for the patient than the one we're discussing. I'm fine with images taken (with appropriate permissions) from medical journals (e.g. the tonsillectomy photo), because there's a clear chain of provenance and medical journals generally demand that authors certify that appropriate human-subjects protections exist. MastCell Talk 16:49, 18 May 2011 (UTC)
Here is the image under discussion. per request of another editor. It was in the article for a long time until recently edit-warred out of the article without consensus. The article is presently frozen due to the edit war. No one has suggested any replacement fir this image, no one has suggested any copyvio, no one has pointed to any inaccuracy or inauthenticity of what's shown in the image, no one has pointed to any legal right of the mother that may have been infringed, the contributor's name and occupation are available, and the caption to the right makes clear that this is not a typical image of an abortus. A majority of commenters at the image-RFC (linked in the FAQ) agreed we should include an image of this sort. Anythingyouwant ( talk) 09:53, 19 May 2011 (UTC)
I'll list the reasons I strongly object to this photo for the abortion article:
DMSBe, I have to admit that my first impulse was to respond to your post saying, "Oh lighten up, I was just joking". But I'm glad that I took a little time to think about what you said and I realize how insensitive I have been. I was aware that many people look at a photo of a fetus and see it as "a baby - but smaller" for lack of better wording. But I had forgotten that they may see a photo that does not yet look human in the same way: a complete human being. I hope you will accept my apology as I was not trying to be provocative, I was just being thoughtless and I will be more careful in the future. Gandydancer ( talk) 20:31, 21 May 2011 (UTC)
I'm not even going to get into a huge debate about this; I'll state that now, seeing as I know how heated the topics at this article can get and I am not fond of repeating myself over and over again. But as this is the Abortion article, I feel that a picture of an aborted embryo or fetus, or both, should be in this article. Whether in the lead or lower body of the article. And I cannot be convinced otherwise on that. No agenda. No passionate feeling either way. Just what I feel is common sense. People feeling justified that abortion is wrong by seeing the images or people not wanting the images seen to help advance their pro-choice stance are not valid reasons for censorship, seeing as Wikipedia is not censored. Flyer22 ( talk) 06:32, 24 May 2011 (UTC)
When I talk about "serious, respectable reference works", I'm talking about things like Encyclopedia Britannica, or MedlinePlus, or medical textbooks. It is a foundational principle of this project that we're trying to produce a serious, respectable reference work. Therefore, when we have a dispute, it makes sense to look at how other established reference works present a topic. We don't have to slavishly mirror their coverage, but if we want to depart from what seems to be a universal practice among serious reference works, then we should have a good rationale. I mean, something better than " penis pics!" or " WP:NOTCENSORED!", which is basically focusing on the trees and ignoring the forest.
Atlases of human anatomy are certainly not "censored", so how do they illustrate abortion? When I look online at Netter's Atlas, the lone image of therapeutic abortion I find is this one. Notice that a) it depicts a medical, rather than surgical abortion, and b) note the depiction of the embryo. That diagram is what we should aim for - it's instructive rather than gratuitously graphic. MastCell Talk 17:40, 24 May 2011 (UTC)
While it may be true that none of the aforementioned medical articles or medical texts carry a picture of an abortus (I cannot vouch for every medical text), the argument does not really have weight, except in a article that is purely medical. The abortion article is much wider than that, it is also wider than induced abortion, and so specifically what would be or is included in medical articles does not restrict us here except in regard to the medical aspect of the article which should be illustrated appropriately and without violating Wikipedia's principles. The issue of whether to include a picture of a foetus is not one that can be addressed merely by reference to other medical works/articles, or even other encyclopedias. Neither can be invoked as an absolute rule to determine what we include here. By and large when the subject of an article is narrow in scope, I think it is good to try and maintain the scholarly manner/tone of respected reference works within the same field. So in a purely medical article a diagram might suffice. Obviously pertinent to the discussion is whether the picture used is of a embryo/foetus or an abortus. Given the scope of the article I think a picture of a foetus should be part of it. DMSBel ( talk) 20:12, 25 May 2011 (UTC)
I think a diagram of common methods of induced abortion is appropriate - we have one of vacuum aspiration, and we could add one of medical abortion (along the lines of the Netter diagram that I linked). These have the advantage of being serious, informative, clinical, accurate, and in line with how this subject is generally treated by serious, reputable reference works. I think they are more likely to inform the reader, and less likely to immediately suggest that we're trying to shock and/or censor. MastCell Talk 17:24, 26 May 2011 (UTC)
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