DATE: Friday, October 31, 1997              TAG: 9710310641

SECTION: FRONT                   PAGE: A6   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY MARIE JOYCE, STAFF WRITER 

                                            LENGTH:   94 lines

WHO GETS ABORTIONS IN VIRGINIA? ANALYSIS FINDS ANSWERS IN MOST ABORTIONS IN THE STATE, THE ISSUES THAT ATTRACT THE MOST DEBATE DON'T APPLY.

When politicians and activists debate abortion in Virginia, one central question seldom gets attention:

Who in the state actually gets abortions?

Using several databases, The Virginian-Pilot set out to answer that question. The result is an analysis of the more than 103,000 abortions performed in Virginia between 1992 and 1995, the latest year for which records are available.

The numbers show that the issues which have generated the most political debate - parental notification and consent, spousal notification and late-term procedures - do not apply in the majority of abortions.

Among the main findings:

Most abortions are not done on minors.

Statewide and in South Hampton Roads, women in their early 20s have more abortions than other age groups.

Minors under 18 - the segment of the population covered in the parental notification law that took effect in July - accounted for 8 percent of the state's abortions, and 9 percent of abortions on South Hampton Roads residents.

Not only did women in their early 20s have the most abortions, but they had them at a greater rate. In Virginia in 1995, for example, the rate for 21-year-olds was 36 abortions per 1,000 women. For 17-year-olds, the rate was 21 per 1,000 women. For age 30, 15 abortions per 1,000 women.

``You just have a higher level of sexual activity . . . for women in their primary pregnancy years,'' said Susan Tew, spokeswoman for The Alan Guttmacher Institute. Researchers at the institute, which tracks reproductive trends, have found similar age breakdowns.

Included in the listing of abortions: 51 were reportedly done on Virginia girls 12 and younger, while 25 were reported for women age 47 and up.

Most women getting abortions aren't married.

Most abortions - 77 percent statewide and a similar percentage in South Hampton Roads - were reportedly done on out-of-wedlock pregnancies and so would not have been affected by any effort to require spousal notification beforehand.

Gubernatorial candidate James S. Gilmore III has expressed support for the concept of spousal notification but acknowledges that a law requiring it would be unconstitutional.

Most abortions are not late-term.

The vast majority of abortions were done very early in the pregnancy. They did not involve the late-term procedures that have been targeted nationally and in Virginia. Statewide, 96 percent were done in the first trimester; just one-tenth of 1 percent were done in the last trimester.

For South Hampton Roads residents: 93 percent were done in the first trimester, 7 percent in the second, and less than one-twentieth of 1 percent in the final trimester.

``The trend has been for many, many years that nine in 10 overall of abortions are in the first trimester,'' said Tew.

Some other broad trends were identified in The Pilot's analysis:

Statewide, abortions were performed on black women at a rate double that of white women, although the total number of abortions is higher for whites. In 1994 there were about 22 abortions per 1,000 black women of childbearing age, compared with 10 per 1,000 white women.

There's not enough good national data to know whether the higher rates among African-Americans were directly related to poverty, said Tew. However, for abortions overall in the United States, ``The highest rates are under minorities, less educated, unmarried, young women.''

Reflecting a nationwide trend, the total number of abortions, as well as the rate, declined in Virginia during the four-year period.

The drop has been attributed in part to a change in demographics, as the last members of the baby-boom generation move out of their peak childbearing years. Other possible causes include a greater acceptance of women having children outside of marriage, and increased use of birth control.

In 1992, there were 27,844 abortions performed in Virginia, at a rate of about 14 per 1,000 women of childbearing age. In 1995, the total number of abortions was 23,849, at a rate of about 11 per 1,000 women.

The Pilot used several databases in its analysis. From the state Health Department's Center for Health Statistics, the newspaper obtained records of all abortions from 1992 through 1995; the Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service at the University of Virginia provided two databases with population projections for women in Virginia by race and by age.

The results were checked for their consistency with national estimates and previous analyses done by the state Health Department. ILLUSTRATION: Graphic

The Virginian-Pilot

ABORTIONS IN SOUTH HAMPTON ROADS

SOURCE: Center for Health Statistics - Virginia Health Department

[For complete graphic, please see microfilm] KEYWORDS: ABORTIONS VIRGINIA U.S.

STATISTICS

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