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ABORTION AS A BACKUP METHOD FOR CONTRACEPTIVE FAILURE IN CHINA

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 April 2004

DUOLAO WANG ,
HONG YAN  and
ZHONGHUI FENG
DUOLAO WANG
Affiliation:
Medical Statistics Unit, Department of Epidemiology & Population Health, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London
HONG YAN
Affiliation:
Health Statistics Unit, School of Medicine, Xi’an, Jiaotong University, Xi’an, Shaanxi, China
ZHONGHUI FENG
Affiliation:
Health Statistics Unit, School of Medicine, Xi’an, Jiaotong University, Xi’an, Shaanxi, China
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Abstract

Contraceptive failure rates for modern methods including sterilization are reported to be high in China, but little is known about the consequence of contraceptive failure and characteristics of women who decide to have an abortion if a contraceptive failure occurs. Using 6225 contraceptive failures from the 1988 Chinese Two-per-Thousand Fertility Survey, this study examines the resolution of contraceptive failure and assesses the impact of some women’s sociodemographic characteristics on the decision to terminate contraceptive failure in abortion. This study has three important findings: (1) The abortion rate was 50·1%, 75·3% and 80·2% for IUD, condom and pill failures, respectively; (2) The abortion rates differed by contraceptive method and women’s social and demographic characteristics. In particular, a woman with just one child was most likely to have the contraceptive failure aborted; (3) Some women experienced repeated abortions because of contraceptive failure. The results suggest that abortion was a backup method if contraception failed in China and the correlates of aborting an unwanted pregnancy reflect the strong impact of the Chinese family planning programme.

Type
Regular Articles
Information
Journal of Biosocial Science , Volume 36 , Issue 3 , May 2004 , pp. 279 - 287
Copyright
© 2004 Cambridge University Press

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