© 1998 VNN


USA

02/27/98 - 1648

Number One Cause of Death in the U.S.

USA (VNN) - by Phil Sherrod

As hard as it may be to believe, abortion is the number one cause of death in the United States.

The following figures for causes of death were taken from Table 250A, "Deaths from 72 selected causes, 1993" published by the Division of Vital Statistics, National Center for Health Statistics.

1993 is the last year for which full statistics are available.

Of course, our government doesn't consider abortion to be "death", so the abortion figure is taken from page 1 of "Abortion Surveillance -- United States, 1992" Vol. 45, No. SS-3, published by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) on May 3, 1996 (it takes several years for them to collect and report the statistics).

The AIDS death statistics are for the year 1995; they were obtained from Table 9 in "HIV/AIDS Surveillance Report, Vol. 8, No. 1, June 1996", published by the CDC.

The abortion death figure does not include deaths of the mothers as a result of abortions, it is just the deaths of the babies. The abortion death count also does not count illegal or unreported abortions, nor does it include multiple pregnancy (twins, triplets, etc.) deaths, or deaths in mothers that may occur years later due to an increased risk of breast cancer. 

   Cause of death                    Number of deaths
   -------------------------------   ----------------
   Induced abortions                      1,359,145
   Cardiovascular disease                   948,088
   Cancer (all types)                       529,904
   Pulmonary disease (emphysema, etc.)      101,077
   Pneumonia and influenza                   82,820
   Infectious diseases (not AIDS)            70,143
   Diabetes                                  53,894
   Accidents other than motor vehicle        48,630
   AIDS                                      43,652
   Motor vehicle accidents                   41,893
   Suicide                                   31,102
   Homicide                                  26,009
   Liver disease                             25,209
   Kidney disease                            23,317

Here are some comparisons to put these statistics in perspective:

About every two weeks (14.7 days) there are as many deaths due to induced abortions as there were in the entire Vietnam war (55,000).

If induced abortions were reduced by 50% the savings of lives would be greater than finding a cure for all cancer.

We spend millions of dollars installing air bags in cars to save a few thousand lives, but the total deaths due to automobile accidents amount to only 3% of the deaths due to induced abortions.

As startling as these statistics are, they are underestimates of the actual deaths due to induced abortions. The CDC's "Abortion Surveillance -- United States, 1992" document contains the following statement on pages 34-35: "The numbers, ratios, and rates of abortion from this analysis are conservative estimates because the number of legal abortions reported to CDC for 1992 was probably lower than the number actually performed. Totals provided by central health agencies are often lower than those obtained by direct surveys of abortion providers. For example, the total number of abortions reported to CDC for 1992 was approximately 11% lower than that reported to The Alan Guttmacher Institute (AGI), a private organization that directly contacts abortion providers to obtain information on the number of abortions performed."

If the reported number is 11% too low, then the actual number of induced abortions would be 1,508,651 which exceeds the total deaths due to heart disease, strokes, and cancer combined.

According to "Abortion Surveillance -- United States, 1992, Table 6A" 49% of the induced abortions were performed after 8 weeks of gestation, 25% after 10 weeks; approximately 20,000 babies were aborted after 21 weeks (about 5 months) of gestation.


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