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Majority of UK Women Want Abortion Restricted by Law

By Gudrun Schultz

GREAT BRITAIN, UK, February 1, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Women in the United Kingdom want to see more legal protection for unborn children.

An opinion poll from January conducted by Ipsos MORI found widespread public support for greater restrictions on abortion, particularly among women. Almost 60 percent of all women polled want to see greater restrictions on abortion access. 47 per cent want to see the current limit of 24 weeks reduced, while ten percent of women want to see abortion banned entirely, “under any circumstances.”

Less than one third of women and just over one third of men questioned think the present limit should stand as it is. Only two per cent of women and five per cent of men want to see abortion limits increased to more than 24 weeks.

Advances in ultrasound technology that allow a clear view of the child’s face in the womb appear to have affected public opinion.  In particular, images of unborn children smiling and frowning at 24 weeks have had an impact.

Cardinal Cormac Murphy O’Connor, leader of the Roman Catholic Church in Britain, plans to encourage the government to conduct a review of the existing law, his spokesman told Reuters.

“The Cardinal sees in this moral awakening a growing unease with, and erosion of, the idea of abortion as simply a woman’s right,” Dr. Austen Ivereigh, spokesman for Cardinal O’Connor, said. “There has been a moral awakening over the last few years about abortion—the British public have been undergoing a reality check.”

Some pro-abortion MPs have begun to look at the possibility of supporting a reduction in abortion limits, based on medical advances that have further improved viability rates for premature babies—Current legislation is based on viability. In 1990 legislation was passed reducing the original limit of 28 weeks to 24 after doctors stated babies could now be considered viable at an earlier age.

Abortion was legalized in Britain in 1967.  Approximately 200,000 children die each year under the current laws.
 
Ipsos MORI interviewed 1,790 people aged 16 to 64 by online questionnaire between 6 and 10 January.

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