Abortion or carry to term? Most women say they made the right decision, poll suggests
Global News
A new Angus Reid poll highlights the sheer number of Canadians who have experienced an unwanted pregnancy or know someone who has, and the decisions those women have made.
A large majority of Canadian women who have experienced an unplanned or unwanted pregnancy agree they made the right decision whether they chose to get an abortion or carry that pregnancy to term, according to a new poll released Tuesday.
The Angus Reid Institute poll also suggests while three in 10 women in Canada have personally experienced an unwanted pregnancy, another 40 per cent said they are close with someone who has had an abortion, and 20 per cent had a close friend or family member who carried that pregnancy to term.
“I think these data show us that these are issues that, number one, have affected and touched a huge number of women in this country,” Angus Reid Institute president Shachi Kurl told Global News.
“And at the end of the day, for them, they are making decisions or have made decisions that they felt was the right decision for them to make.”
Over 1,800 Canadians were surveyed in late August for Tuesday’s poll, which is the first of a three-part series looking at abortion in Canada.
The focus on abortion was renewed this summer after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, a 1973 court decision that enshrined Americans’ right to the procedure. The June decision allowed individual state governments to legislate whether abortion would be allowed, with more than a dozen states outright banning it. Courts in nearly a dozen more states have blocked efforts to enact bans or severe limitations.
In Canada, the issue was also brought up during the most recent Conservative Party leadership contest, which forced candidates to take a stand on if they were pro-choice and if they would allow anti-abortion legislation to be introduced by party members as leader.
Kurl says the new polling is an important way to reframe the issue of abortion as a personal choice, rather than a political or moral issue.
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