Abortion rates are on the rise in the United States. There were over a million abortions in the United States in 2023. Many progressives have suggested that this rise shows that abortion bans are ineffective and that the American public increasingly views abortion as a total right. However, when considering the unequal health care system and inadequate policies, it is clear that the rise in abortion rates are evidence that America has failed women.
The rise in abortion rates serves as evidence that women’s health has been neglected for far too long and that American society has failed to properly meet the needs of women. I believe that expanding abortion rates is a symptom of the epidemic of mistreatment of women in the health care system. The American medical system still subconsciously labels women with experiencing “female hysteria,” brushing away women’s concerns as side issues. This causes a lack of intentional focus on developing precise healthcare options for women. I have frequently visited the doctor’s office with pain, just for them to disregard my concerns and tell me to deal with it. Many women express similar experiences of their health concerns being neglected by doctors.
Women are commonly prescribed birth control for any issue they experience: acne, irregular periods, weight loss, etc. There is a cultural expectation that when a girl reaches the age of 12, she ought to go on birth control. This catch-all is not empowering. Why can’t women have precise care for their health concerns? The system-wide minimization of women’s health concerns has made abortion appear as a “positive good” in society.
Any display of the negative impacts of abortion on women is immediately disregarded. Recently, I attended a lecture on the scientific and philosophical natures of abortion in which the speaker proclaimed abortion as safe and effective. It is the typical belief of young women that abortion is a safe option in the case of an unwanted pregnancy.
With the increase of chemical abortions to over 63% of American abortions, these “safe abortions” are anything but safe. Symptoms can sometimes include hemorrhaging. Moreover, the increasing access to chemical abortion due to the FDA’s 2021 and 2023 expansion to telemedicine appointments and online abortion purchases may enable traffickers and abusive partners to force their female partners to have an abortion.
This is not empowering. Women, again, are left in the dust. Why are doctors not providing women care that enables them to choose to have their child, rather than feeling succumbed to abortion? The simple answer is money and power. Pregnancy complications can be treated in a variety of ways that are not abortion. Ectopic pregnancies are not elective abortions. Moreover, abortions can be dangerous physically, and especially mentally. If the healthcare industry provided adequate medical care to women, rather than solely the scapegoat of abortion, women would be empowered to make informed decisions regarding their health.
Limited healthcare support is not the only way our society has failed women.
Governmental and organizational policy continue to fall short of supporting women comprehensively. Thus, abortion is considered the financially safe option for women.
Unpaid maternity leave is the norm across the country. The average length of paid and unpaid maternity leave is 10 weeks. About one in four women return to work after two months. Women who have recently switched employers or work for small firms do not even qualify under the mandated 12-week, job-protected maternity leave standard in the country. These horrifying policies continue, but the simple fact is that women are neglected, manifesting in dangerous societal views on womanhood.
Abortion enables the government to decrease its focus on providing support for a woman in her pregnancy and in the raising of her child. Abortion rates are rising as America has failed to support underprivileged women to choose life. Federal and state governments continuously deny expanding welfare opportunities in ways that would benefit women. Every state should mandate sales tax exemptions on baby and maternity goods, expand paid maternity leave and enforce proper child support.
Americans are under a false impression about the gains to truly support women in which situations such as this have happened. Pregnancy help centers, which transform the lives of women by providing them with financial, emotional and physical support, are often labeled as “coercive.” This language misguides women into thinking abortion is their only option.
My time volunteering with my hometown’s pregnancy help center showed me the proper care women are owed. Women were met as their whole person, not merely reduced to the various social categories of their lives. I experienced this transformation everyday: as I spoke to one woman in my broken Spanish, I saw a woman empowered to care for both herself and her child. She left the pregnancy center not only with diapers and maternity clothes, but with a heart on fire and confidence in herself.
To live in the right relationship with all people, as justice entails, means supporting them toward greater fulfillment. Rather than stalemate at our current inadequacy, our country must aim to progress to make life the easiest choice. As a pro-life feminist woman, I am confident there is a future in which society truly supports women to choose life. In achieving this, we will begin to actually respect women as equal in our society, and not subject them to the harm of abortion.
Abigail Adams, FCRH ’26, is a double major in mathematics/economics and political science from Alexandria, Va.