Pro-lifers: Drop in abortions in Italy doesn't lessen issue's gravity

Published: 2008-04-23

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- An Italian government report documenting a drop in the number of abortions in Italy and an increase in the number of doctors refusing to perform the procedure does not lessen the gravity of the government allowing innocent children to be put to death, said the head of Italy's Movement for Life. Carlo Casini, the movement's president, told Vatican Radio April 23 that the main point of the report was to defend the legalization of abortion "as if it were not questionable." The Ministry of Health's annual report on "the voluntary interruption of pregnancy," released April 22, said the 127,038 abortions performed in Italian hospitals and clinics in 2007 represented a 3 percent decline from the number of abortions reported in 2006 and an almost 46 percent decline from 1982. In 1982, the government said, 234,801 abortions were performed, the highest number reported in the 30 years that abortion has been legal in Italy.

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