CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
Background of Study
Abortion is a relatively used term. It is the word used to describe the act of termination or destruction of a pregnancy. It could also mean a plan or arrangement, which goes wrong before it can develop properly or termination of a pregnancy of a woman before it reaches full term. Abortion as we are concerned with in this study is the act of stopping the development of a child inside a woman especially by a medical operation (Okonofua, 2001). Many of the teenage girls engage in an unsafe abortion without the help of a medical doctor without considering the effects that this abortion will have on them.
Vanrell (1986) abortion is an age-old practice. It was universally practiced but was not universally accepted. It was seen as a social evil, one that brought down the curse of the gods. The evil notion that the primitive people had about abortion was so profound that it was believed in some tribes that is a woman who has just procure an abortion could cause a man to be sterile and that abortion can also disrupt the balance of nature.
The reasons above did not stop the practice of abortion among primitive people. A woman in the olden days would rather have their child terminated, rather than raised in slavery.
Pregnancy involving members of the same family were aborted because it was seen as a taboo, lactating woman who became pregnant was aborted to ensure the flow of milk for the new baby.
Primitive man used crude, traumatic and ineffective means to terminate pregnancy and most of the victims died. Today, abortion continues to be practiced whether forbidden or accepted for a variety of social, political, economic and religious reasons that are not completely different from those given by the primitive man.
Over the years man has improved in science and technology and has been able to tackle problems more effectively than the primitive man. Man has been able to eradicate a lot of diseases from the planet of the earth, has invented easier and faster means of cooking, transportation and lives in better environment than the primitive man.
If modern man has been able to visit the moon, invent airplanes and eradicate a lot of diseases from the face of the earth, is seen as less primitive, than why is he still very primitive in the way he solves the problem of unwanted pregnancies.
Abortion is seen by many people in the world today, as immoral, an act that calls for punishment from both God and man. Many others still see it as a means of regulating the population and balancing the socio-economic need of the family. According to Myles (1990) abortion is a life threatening issue one that has claimed the lives of thousand of young women and girls all over the world. It is an issue that concerns everyone in the society, no matter what your stand on abortion is?
Abortion is one of the most explosive issues of the decade, igniting, raging debates in political, social, medical and theological fields all over the world. For instance, let us consider the state of a confused young girl of fifteen years who gets pregnant and she desperate for a solution because she is unable to face the consequences of being pregnant at fifteen.
This young girl may not even know who is responsible for a pregnancy, and even know that she is pregnant until obvious signs of pregnancy (protruding abdomen) being to show. This young girl then discovers she is pregnant and decides to procure an abortion either on her own or with the aid of someone.
The image is frightening that a young girl of such a tender age, both physically and emotionally immature finds herself on an operating room where she gives up her body and her life to the sharp instrument of the abortionist. On the other hand, this young girl may decide to procure the abortion herself or she may find herself in the hand of other quacks such as peers, native doctors, nurses and other paramedical quacks. If after the abortion, this young girl dies or she survives with severe complications either as a result of self procured abortion or that carried out by a qualified abortionist and other quacks. Who is to be blamed for her death? Is it her parents, teachers, school friends, the young girl herself, the abortionist or the society as a whole?