Despite medical arguments, most people agree money worries play a part. Celia Hall reports
EVERY year in England and Wales there are nearly 160,000 abortions. Latest figures show that numbers rose by 14.5 per cent in the spring and summer of last year following doubts about the safety of the Pill.
Thousands of women stopped taking the Pill after a warning in October 1995 by the Department of Health that seven brands of commonly-used contraceptives had a slightly higher risk of causing thrombosis.
Nearly half of the women who had abortions have no other children; more than 100,000 of them were single; 35,000 were married and the rest were divorced or separated or their status was unknown.
Nearly 110,000 were between 20 and 34 in 1995, according to the most recent available breakdown of the data. More than 90 per cent of these abortions are allowed under the 1967 Abortion Act, when two doctors sign a statement saying that the pregnancy risks the "mental or physical" health of the woman.
There is not much argument today that abortion up to the 24th week of the pregnancy is easily available for women who do not want to have the baby.
Despite the fraught debate that surrounds abortion there is one area where there is little argument.
There is agreement that panic about money and how to support the baby is almost always uppermost in the mind of the woman faced with the confirmation of an unplanned pregnancy.
Many doctors have become uneasy about the wide availability of abortion although there is little appetite within the medical profession to take on the debate.
Dr Sanday Macara, chairman of the British Medical Association, is prepared to voice this apprehension.
"The Act was never intended to provide abortion on demand," he said yesterday.
"What does worry a lot of us is the polarisation, being forced into positions which are pro-life or pro-choice.
"That is a shocking situation when what we should be considering in every individual case are the best interests of every mother and every baby. There is no doubt in my mind that lack of money plays a big part.
"We have all seen desperate women, pregnant again, who hear the cries of their hungry children with not enough food in their stomachs.
"What we should be able to do is to balance all the considerations to see how we can best help women - to get women the help they really need.
"The Abortion Act was about need and not about demand," he said.
Some practical help does exist for women who specifically decide to go ahead with their pregnancies.
The charity Life runs 44 houses for women without support who want to have their babies.
Local authorities pay the women's housing benefit directly to Life and the organisation helps the women to claim their personal state benefits.
At any time the charity is housing about 200 women who stay for nine months to a year, before and after their babies are born.
It is also planning to run a small number of "next stage" flats for women with toddlers.
In addition it has its "Gemma Fund" based on an Italian programme, which can provide immediate financial help in a crisis.
Last week it sent £150 to a pregnant woman whose boyfriend was out of work.
"The bills were piling up and they were short of food. This was a king's ransom to this family," said Prof Jack Scarisbrick, the chairman of Life.
"We gave another woman who was expecting triplets £75 to buy a buggy."
Prof Scarisbrick said, however, that the charity would not be blackmailed. It does not help women who say they will abort their baby unless Life gives them money.
"There is no doubt in my mind that economic pressure - even if it is imagined rather than real - is part of the panic that a woman experiences, and abortion thrives on fear," he said.
"She thinks she won't be able to cope. Her mother says, ΓÇÿYou won't be able to cope, dear'.
"A little money at the right time as well as other support just gives a woman time - helps her to cool down a bit and not rush into a decision," he said.
Life receives 90,000 calls a year on its counselling and advice line.
