This is not a post I want to write.
/
I have heard snippets about this. I think I may have first read it on a blog or two, but I can't recall which ones. Today I decided to do a little fact checking, hoping that the data was manipulated in an unethical way or simply misread.
It wasn't.
Hear this, y'all: According to a report from the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene,
(Let me pause to confess that I'm having trouble seeing my screen through my tears right now. I've been thinking about this for days now, and my heart just aches. Almost half of preborn babies never see the light of day in NYC, more than half for babies whose mothers are single or black or younger than 25.)
A few pages before the abortion stats, the authors of the report state that the infant mortality rate in 2009 was the lowest it's ever been. Of course, that's if you only count the babies who made it to infancy.
On page 48, a figure showed the estimation of years of life lost by premature deaths to various causes. The highest, malignant neoplasms, was estimated to have claimed between 50,000 and 60,000 years of life prematurely from people under age 65 who died from that cause.
It makes me want to beg, demand, scream for them to calculate how many years of life were lost to abortion. I'm pretty sure it would knock malignant neoplasms out of first place, wouldn't you say?
As I write this, I'm struggling with my tone. I'm not sure if I want this post to sadden you or anger you or inform you or incite you to action or do something else entirely.
All I know is that I saw my babies at 7 weeks and 6 weeks of pregnancy, respectively, on ultrasounds with little hearts beating. Little ones who already, even before that moment, had the unique genetic material that today make our daughter's eyes blue and our son's brown.
All I know is that God creates life and that He was knitting each of those 87,273 babies in their mother's wombs, per Psalm 139.
All I know is that it's MLK day. Yes, we have an African-American man as president. But I don't think Reverend King would call this progress.
So what do we do? Pray. Pray. And then pray some more.
Pray for all of these women.
Pray for women like them in 2011, that someone would love them and support them both before and after the birth so that abortion doesn't seem like the best answer.
Pray specifically for support to grow for single women and black women and young women in NYC, those who are more likely to abort a child than give birth to him or her.
Pray for efforts like this one (registration may be required, but it's free) to continue and grow, that the church (and by that I mean the body of believers in Christ, irrespective of where they worship) would step up with more than just simple slogans to make a meaningful difference in Christ for babies in NYC.
Pray for the women who have had abortions and who may read posts like this one and articles like the one above and feel personally targeted or attacked for a choice they made in less-than-desirable circumstances. (And, if that's you, please know that there is forgiveness at the cross and that I am too covered in my own sin to condemn you for yours.)
Pray for the men involved.
And pray for New York City, which in 2009 alone lost the opportunity to welcome 87,273 babies into the world.
And, as you pray, it's okay to cry too. I'm certain I've never shed more tears over any blog post than this one.
Edited to add: I've been asked a few times if it's okay to link to this. Definitely feel free to do so. While heart-wrenching, this is information that needs to be known and shared and prayed over.
It wasn't.
Hear this, y'all: According to a report from the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene,
- In 2009, there were 214,454 pregnancies in NYC. Of those, 87,273 ended by "induced termination," according to Table 4.17. That's 40.7% of pregnancies in NYC ending in abortion (and, no, that doesn't include miscarriages, which are medically termed spontaneous abortions).
- For women classified as black in NYC, there were 40,798 abortions. And only 27,405 live births. I can't say conclusively what percentage that is because I couldn't find data in the report for how many pregnancies to black women ended in miscarriage, but I can say that for every two children born to black mothers in 2009, three were aborted (well, technically 2.96, but I rounded up).
- For girls ages 15 to 17, there were 2,308 live births in 2009. And 5,185 abortions.
- This news isn't restricted to 2009. The data available from previous years isn't much different.
- In the past decade, according to Table 4.19, about 15% of abortions in New York City were to married women, while 81-83.6% were to single women (and the rest to those of unknown marital status). Unmarried women had 72,962 abortions compared to 55,767 live births in 2009.
- For women under age 25, more babies were aborted than born, according to Figure 4.7.
(Let me pause to confess that I'm having trouble seeing my screen through my tears right now. I've been thinking about this for days now, and my heart just aches. Almost half of preborn babies never see the light of day in NYC, more than half for babies whose mothers are single or black or younger than 25.)
A few pages before the abortion stats, the authors of the report state that the infant mortality rate in 2009 was the lowest it's ever been. Of course, that's if you only count the babies who made it to infancy.
On page 48, a figure showed the estimation of years of life lost by premature deaths to various causes. The highest, malignant neoplasms, was estimated to have claimed between 50,000 and 60,000 years of life prematurely from people under age 65 who died from that cause.
It makes me want to beg, demand, scream for them to calculate how many years of life were lost to abortion. I'm pretty sure it would knock malignant neoplasms out of first place, wouldn't you say?
As I write this, I'm struggling with my tone. I'm not sure if I want this post to sadden you or anger you or inform you or incite you to action or do something else entirely.
All I know is that I saw my babies at 7 weeks and 6 weeks of pregnancy, respectively, on ultrasounds with little hearts beating. Little ones who already, even before that moment, had the unique genetic material that today make our daughter's eyes blue and our son's brown.
All I know is that God creates life and that He was knitting each of those 87,273 babies in their mother's wombs, per Psalm 139.
All I know is that it's MLK day. Yes, we have an African-American man as president. But I don't think Reverend King would call this progress.
So what do we do? Pray. Pray. And then pray some more.
Pray for all of these women.
Pray for women like them in 2011, that someone would love them and support them both before and after the birth so that abortion doesn't seem like the best answer.
Pray specifically for support to grow for single women and black women and young women in NYC, those who are more likely to abort a child than give birth to him or her.
Pray for efforts like this one (registration may be required, but it's free) to continue and grow, that the church (and by that I mean the body of believers in Christ, irrespective of where they worship) would step up with more than just simple slogans to make a meaningful difference in Christ for babies in NYC.
Pray for the women who have had abortions and who may read posts like this one and articles like the one above and feel personally targeted or attacked for a choice they made in less-than-desirable circumstances. (And, if that's you, please know that there is forgiveness at the cross and that I am too covered in my own sin to condemn you for yours.)
Pray for the men involved.
And pray for New York City, which in 2009 alone lost the opportunity to welcome 87,273 babies into the world.
And, as you pray, it's okay to cry too. I'm certain I've never shed more tears over any blog post than this one.
Edited to add: I've been asked a few times if it's okay to link to this. Definitely feel free to do so. While heart-wrenching, this is information that needs to be known and shared and prayed over.
