The 247,703 recorded abortions in 2022 is a 13.1 percent increase from the 218,923 abortions recorded in 2021. The numbers represent a nearly 50 percent jump in abortions since 2012, when 20.84 percent of conceptions ended in termination.
Most conceptions – 61.7 percent – occurred outside of marriage or civil partnerships. Within marriage or civil partnerships, 11.1 percent of pregnancies end in abortion, compared to 36 percent of pregnancies outside of them.
The dataset did not measure pregnancies that ended in illegal abortions, meaning the numbers could be even higher. It also did not track pregnancies that ended in miscarriages.
Archbishop John Sherrington, Lead Bishop for Life Issues for the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales, said in a statement, “We need rapidly to re-establish a culture of life in which the unborn child is properly protected in legislation and in which we also provide compassionate assistance to those parents facing trauma as a result of their pregnancy.”
Abortion statistics released this month by the Department of Health in Ireland showed a similarly dire situation. There were 10,852 abortions in Ireland in 2024, which is an 8.16 percent increase since 2023 and a 62.8 percent increase from 2019.
That report also showed that 10,711 – nearly 99 percent – of the abortions were not to protect the health of the mother or as a result of a health condition likely to lead to the baby’s death.
Emily E. Davis, political communications director for Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, called the data “staggering and heart wrenching.” She continued, “One-third is not just a statistic. It represents a generation that never saw the light of day. When the destruction of unborn life becomes so routine, so normalized, it signals a society that has begun to lose sight of the most basic of human rights.”
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Choose life.