SOUNDING OFF:

Patricia Mattson, in a Sept. 25 Sounding Off column (“Calling attention to Obama’s hypocrisy”), claims Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama is a hypocrite because he is against the Iraq war but is pro-choice. In complaining about Obama’s pro-choice position Mattson makes numerous erroneous claims about abortion.

Abortion is one of the most common medical procedures performed on women ages 15 to 44 in the U.S. One of every three women will have an abortion by the time she reaches the age of 45. The number of abortions performed in the U.S. peaked at 1.6 million in 1990 and has steadily declined to 1.2 million in 2005 (the latest year figures are available). The abortion rate in 2005 was the same as it was in 1974.

Abortion is not a widely used method of birth control. More than half of all women having an abortion will have only one during their fertile years.

The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that a fetus achieves “personhood (viability)”at the end of the second trimester of pregnancy. About 80% of all abortions occur within the first 10 weeks of pregnancy.

Mattson argues that life begins at conception. Using her definition, a fertility doctor who destroys unused fertilized embryos would be committing first-degree murder. Similarly, a pharmaceutical company that sells birth control pills would be considered to be a murderer since birth control pills prevent a fertilized egg from attaching to a woman’s uterus.

Mattson claims that Planned Parenthood has received $305 million to perform abortions. Since 1977 federal funding of abortions under the Medicaid program is only allowed in cases of rape, incest and life endangerment. Planned Parenthood does not receive federal money to pay for elective abortions. They do receive federal money to provide indigent women family planning and gynecological services.

Finally, Mattson uses the latest “scare tactic” by pro-fetus groups claiming that an abortion increases the risk to women of developing breast cancer, infertility, mental illness and fetal pain.

In 2003, the National Cancer Institute concluded “induced abortion is not associated with an increase in breast cancer risk.” In 1990, the American Psychological Assn. found that induced abortion does not lead to suicidal behavior, drug use, eating disorders or “postabortion stress syndrome.” The near unanimous scientific finding is that the most common first-trimester abortion procedure — vacuum aspiration — poses no long-term risk of infertility, ectopic pregnancy spontaneous abortion or congenital birth defects.

In order for a fetus to feel pain it must be able to transmit sensory information and the fetus must be able to interpret this information. According to a 2005 article in the Journal of the American Medical Assn., this is unlikely to occur until at least 29 weeks of gestation.

Mattson makes one other egregious error, which is to use the term “partial birth abortion.” The American Medical Assn. does not recognize this term, which was coined by a Republican pollster from focus group interviews. There is a late-term procedure called dilation and extraction, but it is estimated that only between 1,500 and 2,500 abortions use this procedure, typically during the third trimester when there is a fetal abnormality that could cause permanent damage to a woman’s reproductive system.

Mattson’s claim that Obama is a hypocrite for being pro-choice would have more credibility if her claims, charges and assertions about abortion were factually accurate.

MARSHALL MEDOFF is a Huntington Beach resident and a research professor at Cal State Long Beach.