Daily: Serbia tops abortion league table

I think abortions should be made illegal by the government in Serbia. I call on parliament to adopt a bill on this immediately. Unless the women trying to get an abortion has been raped, could have possible health affects by having the baby, could die if the baby is born, then there is no excuse for allowing abortion in my eyes under no other circumstance.

This is really very sad. Basically what these statistics show is it that there could be 150,000 more Serbs born in Serbia every year. This a culture of death. Wake up Serbia!

Amazing that they are so stupid as to not take the simple precaution of using contraceptives. It would save the mental trauma of abortion and be much less burden on the states finances. The government should make people pay for their abortion. I'm sure women would be much more careful then.

Nikola,
women do not need an excuse, terminating a pregnancy is not a privilege which you or the government allow to women. Women, like men, have the right to decide what is going to go on inside their own body. It is most definitely not up to you to decide what reasons are the right reasons for an abortion. Why should abortion be legal in the case of rape? The embryo/fetus is completely innocent of any wrongdoing. Why should abortion be legal in the case a woman has a health problem? One life is not more valuable than another life, is it? Why should a fetus die so that a woman, even if she has 3 other children who need her, live?
Once the self-righteous so-called right to lifers realise that they care only about punishing women who have sex outside of somebody else's norms of good behaviour and not about protecting any innocent lives - then they will wake up to the fact that the only people who are in a position to know what is the best thing to do when faced with an unwanted pregnancy are the people directly involoved - the woman, her family and her doctor.

"Nikola, women do not need an excuse, terminating a pregnancy is not a privilege which you or the government allow to women..."

European - I agree with what you say and you make some very powerful points. BUT in my mind there is a big difference between having a termination before 12 weeks and after.

I am completely against late abortion unless there is a very good reason, and believe there should be strict limits set at 12 weeks (unless of course there are specific complications). There are horror stories coming out of hospitals about late terminations well after 4 months.

The baby has a heartbeat after 8 weeks which keeps on getting stronger as all of his or her organs form. It is a baby being killed at around 5 months, not just a fetus.

At 18 - 26 weeks the nervous system is developing and some movement is felt by the mother.

There are certain practices that are carried out in Serbia and Montenegro (and probably many other countries in the region) which would not be done elsewhere in Europe.

For example, as far as I uderstand it there is no choice but to have an amniocentesis (which carries a risk of miscarriage), where as in other European nations this is the woman's choice.

There does seem to be a very ill educated attitude towards pregnancy if so many women are having terminations. I have to agree very strongly with Radoslav that it is really "stupid as to not take the simple precaution of using contraceptives.

"It would save the mental trauma of abortion and be much less burden on the states finances. The government should make people pay for their abortion. I'm sure women would be much more careful then."

I would just add that it may also make men more careful too. It takes two to tango.

Abortion should never be used as an alternative to contraception - that's just terrible and unnecessary.

Amazing that they are so stupid as to not take the simple precaution of using contraceptives. It would save the mental trauma of abortion and be much less burden on the states finances.

Welcome to modern Serbia, women here doesn't want to go "on the pill" since they might gain 5 kg of weight, sad but true..

An old communistic tradition (abortion) is well spoken of instead of using contraceptives.

I belive that abortion should be the womans choice until week 12, after that only for health reasons and in specific cases such as rape and incest.

However, I really suggest some information to change the attitude of women in Serbia towards abortion, at least let them (and the father)pay for it in full, the state shouldn't sponsor this kind of "healt care"

european

Your criticism is rife with Judgment. What this article describes is a trajedy and not some nonsensical excercize in freedom and democracy.

By the way their is sometimes a distinction between freedom and democracy that you don't seem to apprehend.

let me explain: lets say tomorrow there was a referendum in France where the question was "should we jail all people named Osama" lets say 80 percent of voters attended and 99 percent of voters agreed that people named Osama should be jailed.

This would be completely in keeping with democracy but it sure wouldn't be in keeping with freedom and that sure would not make it okay.

To go farther throughout the west, women were not considered as persons under the law until they struggled for it in the first half of the twentieth century. In the end the law could not prevent their humanity.

Currently fetuses are not considered persons, but that don't make it so.

Sad

@European

You are sadly mistaken. You say a women has a choice of what goes in and our of her body. I agree with you on that, she has a choice if she wants to have sex or not, and if she was raped then I support the woman's to choose if she wants to keep the child or not.

However, to say the unborn babies life is in the hands of the woman is absurd. The unborn baby did nothing wrong and deserves a chance at a life like everyone else.

Other than extenuating circumstances, criminalize abortion!

Very depressive news, indeed.

Kate,

I just want to make a small correction to your claims on amniocentesis. As a matter of the fact, this medical performance is not obligatory in Serbia. Of course, amniocentesis is warmly recommended by the doctors for the women aged over 35 years because there are always certain risks (gene- malformations) with pregnancies after 35 years of age in women. There is always a choice and woman is allowed to say no to amniocentesis.

For everything else I completely agree with you and with some other posters.

The thing is that such high number of performed abortions represent real problem that Serbia faces. The one may think what the real solution is since there is such bad attitude when it comes to use of contraceptives.

Imposing the huge prise on abortion in medical institutions wouldn’t solve the problem completely but it would certainly yield some fruits to some extend. Decreasing in half would be a success. However, I am afraid this would open a space for illegal abortion performances everywhere else (does not have to be necessarily performed in hospitals), plus it would leave space for more corruption inside medical institutions. There is always chance to find some corrupt doctor who can be bribed with less amount of money than official abortion price.
Luckily, still many cannot bribe doctors so there is chance to decrease number of abortions.

Another and most successful solution in long run is education. Unfortunately Serbia is still pretty much conservative society and people do not openly talk about sexual health. The first information children should get from their own parents. This topic should be openly discussed inside family circle. Of course, if parents feel unable or uncomfortable to speak with own children about it then they should send children to youth advisory centres which operate in nearly every health centres in Serbia.

Finally, education at schools is one of the best and should be the first mechanism in beating this problem. Health and educational system in Serbia failed miserably since there is no health and sexual education at schools. This is the place where youngsters should get all the information needed concerning their development and sexual behaviour. For this failure we can point finger at ministry of health and education.

In general, women in Serbia have very bad attitude and many prejudices against contraceptives and that must be changed drastically. That can be only done by education and continuous information. And of course, firstly Serbian society should face the fact that we actually do have a sex and those girls and boys eventually do grow up and get curious about their sexuality already at the age of 15-16. That is exactly the age when the one begin to build an attitude when it comes to sexual behaviour. Finally the girls should be encouraged to accept the positive attitude towards own body and work much on self-esteem.

Biljana - I stand corrected about amnios - that was what I was told by a Montenegrin woman. I was also told that some women take pills to stop their milk very early so that they can lose weight. Is that true?

Good comment, by the way.

Yes, Kate; there are some women who take pills to stop lactation. Some for selfish reasons -subjecting baby's health to their own shallow vanity like losing weight, or being concerned about breast shape, or simply not wanted the "inconvenience" of breastfeeding. The health benefits of breastfeeding for women themselves - possible breast cancer protection, as well as some other benefits for overall health are being unfortunately largely ignored.
Much more of educational efforts is needed, but this type of education has to include men as well. Rearing children is a shared responsibility that starts with conception; not an easy responsibility, but it is unnatural to view it as a burden.
On the topic of contraception, I would love the male part of the forum to read carefully the part of your comment: "It takes two..."
Tank you, Kate, as always.

Kate, firstly thanks for respond

“I was also told that some women take pills to stop their milk very early so that they can lose weight. Is that true?” -Kate

-For this I am not sure, but it is very possible. I do actually believe that some women do that.
I don’t think it is as widely-spread as non-usage of contraceptives but surely some small % of women use this method in order to lose weight.
I wouldn’t say that this method is used only for selfish reasons as @logic put it but primitive too.

While doing my practice (as a registered nurse) in gynaecology/obstetrics ward I have witnessed how abortion is used as alternative to contraceptives and all can say it is really widely spread. Same time I have heard many stories which made me to conclude that women are really ill-informed on contraceptives and uneducated. Where did they come up with such stories is beyond me. But I do blame doctors as well since they don’t give a damn to advice their clients after they performed abortion on them.

I tried many times to talk to the women and actually was giving them different leaflets about so many contraception alternatives but all of them would just thank without showing slightest interest to discus or at least ask for an opinion what alternative would suit them best.

I will only mention this time what was the most common excuse when the women come to abortion. Usually they say “He promised to take care, to protect me”. Imagine this?
I would understand this coming from naive teenage girl who just begun to explore own sexuality, but I cannot understand this when it comes staright from the mouth of an adult woman.

This further makes me think that it does not always take to tango. Of course men should be more involved when it comes to contraception of their partners, but after all it is her body, not his. She is the one who make final decision on contraceptives and if she for some primitive reasons says no to any contraceptive method than we still have one to tango. Yes, man may try to take care but it does not always work like that.

The thing is that woman should not rely to anyone else but herself. She must think about own body and what consequences her body may suffer in the future. Every abortion bears risks and leaves certain consequences that are not visible immediately.

And here were talking mostly about the stable relationships, but what about those one night stand relationships. No one mentions them. Why would any man think about woman's contraception in such occasions? So, woman again must think of herself.
Unfortunately, in most of the cases it takes two to tango but only when it comes to pleasure, but when it comes to pregnancy his part will be to escort her to the first gynaeco ward and hold her hand until she is taken into room for gynaeco interventions. After that, woman is left alone and her body exposed to unpleasant and painful intervention. This certainly leaves trauma not only to the woman’s body but to her psyche as well.

Women must be very educated on sexual behaviour, including education on STD’s.
Health professionals and psychologists must work together making those women and girls respect their body and work on women self-esteem.

"Basically what these statistics show is it that there could be 150,000 more Serbs born in Serbia every year."

Ummm...no. If they had to keep the babies they would use contraception, it's obvious they don't want to have all those kids, just careless with contraception. As the article pointed out, this is horrible since may eventually result in infertility (especially if he doctors aren't very good ones)

Srboslav: "Welcome to modern Serbia, women here doesn't want to go "on the pill" since they might gain 5 kg of weight, sad but true.. "

That is sad, but lots of women don't want to go on the pill now, not just for weight reasons but also because they don't want to feed chemicals into their bodies every day.

There are obviously other options, especially for couples in a monogamous relationship where sexually transmitted diseases are less of a risk (in theory).

But for people who are sexually active, the risk is not just about getting pregnant. It's about sexually transmitted diseases. The only way to stop the spread of these diseases and avoid pregnancy is for the man to wear a condom. Are these free in Serbia?

Also, you mention that late abortion should be allowed in cases such as rape or incest. But it rarely takes 5 months to figure out that you are pregnant from a rape and to do something about it immediately.

The 'morning after' pill should be available in these sorts of cases or as an alternative to abortion if early enough (but again not as an alternative to contraception).

hey serbs,

Better start giving up on Kosovo which breeds over 65 000 Albanian babies per year, with less than 50 abortions per year.

Logic - thanks for confirming. It seems as though vanity and physical appearance does carry far too much influence.

I agree so much with your comment about men sharing reponsibility - from contraception through to child rearing. This is a huge issue because without a two parent role, there can never be true equality in the workplace for women.

Men and women should be able to shape their lives (without impeding their work of course) around bringing up kids. That is a problem shared by most nations, except maybe Sweden.

I understood that Serbia used to have an extended paternity leave at one point before things broke down, and many women over there seem to have senior jobs. So there is obviously some scope to become advanced in this area.

I know there are a lot of men who are excellent hands-on dads, but a lot of comments here are very much focussed on babies being a woman's issue.

By the way, I just wanted to point out that there is something called a nuchal fold test which can be done at around 8 weeks into pregnancy. This is non invasive and does not harm the child, but it shows the possibility of Downs Syndrome very early on and sometimes avoids amnios altogether and the risks that they carry.

I realise that it's easy to talk about these things from a country which has certain structures and systems in place as support mechanisms.

But the main issue here seems to be about contraception. The UK has the highest teen pregnancy rate in Europe, and I am convinced that this has to do with lack of aspiration and hope, as well as sex education failing badly.

Perhaps the same issues are leading in part to this awful statistic in Serbia.

Someone else said it on this thread that abortion can really have a negative impact on the woman as well. Psychologically, emotionally and physically it carries complications which can affect women for years.

Abortion is never a light issue - and certainly not a replacement for a good contraceptive programme. Let the kids at school see what it's like to look after a baby around the clock and not have any free time or money for yourself. I'm sure that would have an impact.

Sorry to have missed this quality discussion as I have a bit to say.

But to sum up more emphasis has to be put on educating men as to their responsibilities.

Look at it this way I have had unprotected sex before, as most men have. Is it consistent as a man to hold a position that all abortion should be outlawed, if the same man is prepared to have unprotected sex?

Essentially it means that if a man has unprotected sex, he must accept at the same time that he must be ready to be a father. If he is not ready to be a father he must stop.

But there is another way, which is basically the male pill. Now personally I don't like taking any pills that arent strictly necessary, but fortunately for me I am not against abortion or against any kind of contraception.

One final thought - the stance of the orthodox church. We know that the church is against abortion, but we also know that certain sections of the church are against contraception. I'm sure that not all women are immune to the churches advice.

hey serbs,

Better start giving up on Kosovo which breeds over 65 000 Albanian babies per year, with less than 50 abortions per year.

Nikola,
women do not need an excuse, terminating a pregnancy is not a privilege which you or the government allow to women. Women, like men, have the right to decide what is going to go on inside their own body. It is most definitely not up to you to decide what reasons are the right reasons for an abortion. Why should abortion be legal in the case of rape? The embryo/fetus is completely innocent of any wrongdoing. Why should abortion be legal in the case a woman has a health problem? One life is not more valuable than another life, is it? Why should a fetus die so that a woman, even if she has 3 other children who need her, live?
Once the self-righteous so-called right to lifers realise that they care only about punishing women who have sex outside of somebody else's norms of good behaviour and not about protecting any innocent lives - then they will wake up to the fact that the only people who are in a position to know what is the best thing to do when faced with an unwanted pregnancy are the people directly involoved - the woman, her family and her doctor.

I think abortions should be made illegal by the government in Serbia. I call on parliament to adopt a bill on this immediately. Unless the women trying to get an abortion has been raped, could have possible health affects by having the baby, could die if the baby is born, then there is no excuse for allowing abortion in my eyes under no other circumstance.

This is really very sad. Basically what these statistics show is it that there could be 150,000 more Serbs born in Serbia every year. This a culture of death. Wake up Serbia!

Amazing that they are so stupid as to not take the simple precaution of using contraceptives. It would save the mental trauma of abortion and be much less burden on the states finances. The government should make people pay for their abortion. I'm sure women would be much more careful then.

@European

You are sadly mistaken. You say a women has a choice of what goes in and our of her body. I agree with you on that, she has a choice if she wants to have sex or not, and if she was raped then I support the woman's to choose if she wants to keep the child or not.

However, to say the unborn babies life is in the hands of the woman is absurd. The unborn baby did nothing wrong and deserves a chance at a life like everyone else.

Other than extenuating circumstances, criminalize abortion!

european

Your criticism is rife with Judgment. What this article describes is a trajedy and not some nonsensical excercize in freedom and democracy.

By the way their is sometimes a distinction between freedom and democracy that you don't seem to apprehend.

let me explain: lets say tomorrow there was a referendum in France where the question was "should we jail all people named Osama" lets say 80 percent of voters attended and 99 percent of voters agreed that people named Osama should be jailed.

This would be completely in keeping with democracy but it sure wouldn't be in keeping with freedom and that sure would not make it okay.

To go farther throughout the west, women were not considered as persons under the law until they struggled for it in the first half of the twentieth century. In the end the law could not prevent their humanity.

Currently fetuses are not considered persons, but that don't make it so.

Sad

"Nikola, women do not need an excuse, terminating a pregnancy is not a privilege which you or the government allow to women..."

European - I agree with what you say and you make some very powerful points. BUT in my mind there is a big difference between having a termination before 12 weeks and after.

I am completely against late abortion unless there is a very good reason, and believe there should be strict limits set at 12 weeks (unless of course there are specific complications). There are horror stories coming out of hospitals about late terminations well after 4 months.

The baby has a heartbeat after 8 weeks which keeps on getting stronger as all of his or her organs form. It is a baby being killed at around 5 months, not just a fetus.

At 18 - 26 weeks the nervous system is developing and some movement is felt by the mother.

There are certain practices that are carried out in Serbia and Montenegro (and probably many other countries in the region) which would not be done elsewhere in Europe.

For example, as far as I uderstand it there is no choice but to have an amniocentesis (which carries a risk of miscarriage), where as in other European nations this is the woman's choice.

There does seem to be a very ill educated attitude towards pregnancy if so many women are having terminations. I have to agree very strongly with Radoslav that it is really "stupid as to not take the simple precaution of using contraceptives.

"It would save the mental trauma of abortion and be much less burden on the states finances. The government should make people pay for their abortion. I'm sure women would be much more careful then."

I would just add that it may also make men more careful too. It takes two to tango.

Abortion should never be used as an alternative to contraception - that's just terrible and unnecessary.

"Basically what these statistics show is it that there could be 150,000 more Serbs born in Serbia every year."

Ummm...no. If they had to keep the babies they would use contraception, it's obvious they don't want to have all those kids, just careless with contraception. As the article pointed out, this is horrible since may eventually result in infertility (especially if he doctors aren't very good ones)

Amazing that they are so stupid as to not take the simple precaution of using contraceptives. It would save the mental trauma of abortion and be much less burden on the states finances.

Welcome to modern Serbia, women here doesn't want to go "on the pill" since they might gain 5 kg of weight, sad but true..

An old communistic tradition (abortion) is well spoken of instead of using contraceptives.

I belive that abortion should be the womans choice until week 12, after that only for health reasons and in specific cases such as rape and incest.

However, I really suggest some information to change the attitude of women in Serbia towards abortion, at least let them (and the father)pay for it in full, the state shouldn't sponsor this kind of "healt care"

Very depressive news, indeed.

Kate,

I just want to make a small correction to your claims on amniocentesis. As a matter of the fact, this medical performance is not obligatory in Serbia. Of course, amniocentesis is warmly recommended by the doctors for the women aged over 35 years because there are always certain risks (gene- malformations) with pregnancies after 35 years of age in women. There is always a choice and woman is allowed to say no to amniocentesis.

For everything else I completely agree with you and with some other posters.

The thing is that such high number of performed abortions represent real problem that Serbia faces. The one may think what the real solution is since there is such bad attitude when it comes to use of contraceptives.

Imposing the huge prise on abortion in medical institutions wouldn’t solve the problem completely but it would certainly yield some fruits to some extend. Decreasing in half would be a success. However, I am afraid this would open a space for illegal abortion performances everywhere else (does not have to be necessarily performed in hospitals), plus it would leave space for more corruption inside medical institutions. There is always chance to find some corrupt doctor who can be bribed with less amount of money than official abortion price.
Luckily, still many cannot bribe doctors so there is chance to decrease number of abortions.

Another and most successful solution in long run is education. Unfortunately Serbia is still pretty much conservative society and people do not openly talk about sexual health. The first information children should get from their own parents. This topic should be openly discussed inside family circle. Of course, if parents feel unable or uncomfortable to speak with own children about it then they should send children to youth advisory centres which operate in nearly every health centres in Serbia.

Finally, education at schools is one of the best and should be the first mechanism in beating this problem. Health and educational system in Serbia failed miserably since there is no health and sexual education at schools. This is the place where youngsters should get all the information needed concerning their development and sexual behaviour. For this failure we can point finger at ministry of health and education.

In general, women in Serbia have very bad attitude and many prejudices against contraceptives and that must be changed drastically. That can be only done by education and continuous information. And of course, firstly Serbian society should face the fact that we actually do have a sex and those girls and boys eventually do grow up and get curious about their sexuality already at the age of 15-16. That is exactly the age when the one begin to build an attitude when it comes to sexual behaviour. Finally the girls should be encouraged to accept the positive attitude towards own body and work much on self-esteem.

Biljana - I stand corrected about amnios - that was what I was told by a Montenegrin woman. I was also told that some women take pills to stop their milk very early so that they can lose weight. Is that true?

Good comment, by the way.

Yes, Kate; there are some women who take pills to stop lactation. Some for selfish reasons -subjecting baby's health to their own shallow vanity like losing weight, or being concerned about breast shape, or simply not wanted the "inconvenience" of breastfeeding. The health benefits of breastfeeding for women themselves - possible breast cancer protection, as well as some other benefits for overall health are being unfortunately largely ignored.
Much more of educational efforts is needed, but this type of education has to include men as well. Rearing children is a shared responsibility that starts with conception; not an easy responsibility, but it is unnatural to view it as a burden.
On the topic of contraception, I would love the male part of the forum to read carefully the part of your comment: "It takes two..."
Tank you, Kate, as always.

Logic - thanks for confirming. It seems as though vanity and physical appearance does carry far too much influence.

I agree so much with your comment about men sharing reponsibility - from contraception through to child rearing. This is a huge issue because without a two parent role, there can never be true equality in the workplace for women.

Men and women should be able to shape their lives (without impeding their work of course) around bringing up kids. That is a problem shared by most nations, except maybe Sweden.

I understood that Serbia used to have an extended paternity leave at one point before things broke down, and many women over there seem to have senior jobs. So there is obviously some scope to become advanced in this area.

I know there are a lot of men who are excellent hands-on dads, but a lot of comments here are very much focussed on babies being a woman's issue.

By the way, I just wanted to point out that there is something called a nuchal fold test which can be done at around 8 weeks into pregnancy. This is non invasive and does not harm the child, but it shows the possibility of Downs Syndrome very early on and sometimes avoids amnios altogether and the risks that they carry.

I realise that it's easy to talk about these things from a country which has certain structures and systems in place as support mechanisms.

But the main issue here seems to be about contraception. The UK has the highest teen pregnancy rate in Europe, and I am convinced that this has to do with lack of aspiration and hope, as well as sex education failing badly.

Perhaps the same issues are leading in part to this awful statistic in Serbia.

Someone else said it on this thread that abortion can really have a negative impact on the woman as well. Psychologically, emotionally and physically it carries complications which can affect women for years.

Abortion is never a light issue - and certainly not a replacement for a good contraceptive programme. Let the kids at school see what it's like to look after a baby around the clock and not have any free time or money for yourself. I'm sure that would have an impact.

Kate, firstly thanks for respond

“I was also told that some women take pills to stop their milk very early so that they can lose weight. Is that true?” -Kate

-For this I am not sure, but it is very possible. I do actually believe that some women do that.
I don’t think it is as widely-spread as non-usage of contraceptives but surely some small % of women use this method in order to lose weight.
I wouldn’t say that this method is used only for selfish reasons as @logic put it but primitive too.

While doing my practice (as a registered nurse) in gynaecology/obstetrics ward I have witnessed how abortion is used as alternative to contraceptives and all can say it is really widely spread. Same time I have heard many stories which made me to conclude that women are really ill-informed on contraceptives and uneducated. Where did they come up with such stories is beyond me. But I do blame doctors as well since they don’t give a damn to advice their clients after they performed abortion on them.

I tried many times to talk to the women and actually was giving them different leaflets about so many contraception alternatives but all of them would just thank without showing slightest interest to discus or at least ask for an opinion what alternative would suit them best.

I will only mention this time what was the most common excuse when the women come to abortion. Usually they say “He promised to take care, to protect me”. Imagine this?
I would understand this coming from naive teenage girl who just begun to explore own sexuality, but I cannot understand this when it comes staright from the mouth of an adult woman.

This further makes me think that it does not always take to tango. Of course men should be more involved when it comes to contraception of their partners, but after all it is her body, not his. She is the one who make final decision on contraceptives and if she for some primitive reasons says no to any contraceptive method than we still have one to tango. Yes, man may try to take care but it does not always work like that.

The thing is that woman should not rely to anyone else but herself. She must think about own body and what consequences her body may suffer in the future. Every abortion bears risks and leaves certain consequences that are not visible immediately.

And here were talking mostly about the stable relationships, but what about those one night stand relationships. No one mentions them. Why would any man think about woman's contraception in such occasions? So, woman again must think of herself.
Unfortunately, in most of the cases it takes two to tango but only when it comes to pleasure, but when it comes to pregnancy his part will be to escort her to the first gynaeco ward and hold her hand until she is taken into room for gynaeco interventions. After that, woman is left alone and her body exposed to unpleasant and painful intervention. This certainly leaves trauma not only to the woman’s body but to her psyche as well.

Women must be very educated on sexual behaviour, including education on STD’s.
Health professionals and psychologists must work together making those women and girls respect their body and work on women self-esteem.

Srboslav: "Welcome to modern Serbia, women here doesn't want to go "on the pill" since they might gain 5 kg of weight, sad but true.. "

That is sad, but lots of women don't want to go on the pill now, not just for weight reasons but also because they don't want to feed chemicals into their bodies every day.

There are obviously other options, especially for couples in a monogamous relationship where sexually transmitted diseases are less of a risk (in theory).

But for people who are sexually active, the risk is not just about getting pregnant. It's about sexually transmitted diseases. The only way to stop the spread of these diseases and avoid pregnancy is for the man to wear a condom. Are these free in Serbia?

Also, you mention that late abortion should be allowed in cases such as rape or incest. But it rarely takes 5 months to figure out that you are pregnant from a rape and to do something about it immediately.

The 'morning after' pill should be available in these sorts of cases or as an alternative to abortion if early enough (but again not as an alternative to contraception).

Sorry to have missed this quality discussion as I have a bit to say.

But to sum up more emphasis has to be put on educating men as to their responsibilities.

Look at it this way I have had unprotected sex before, as most men have. Is it consistent as a man to hold a position that all abortion should be outlawed, if the same man is prepared to have unprotected sex?

Essentially it means that if a man has unprotected sex, he must accept at the same time that he must be ready to be a father. If he is not ready to be a father he must stop.

But there is another way, which is basically the male pill. Now personally I don't like taking any pills that arent strictly necessary, but fortunately for me I am not against abortion or against any kind of contraception.

One final thought - the stance of the orthodox church. We know that the church is against abortion, but we also know that certain sections of the church are against contraception. I'm sure that not all women are immune to the churches advice.