ABSTRACT
On the first and the second occasion, such women are given the help they request, unadorned by sermonizing; they are likewise furnished with proper information about the various methods of birth control. Six months later, they are back again in the offices of the public health consulting agency, with sometimes ashamed, sometimes slightly arrogant looks on their faces. ‘Already?’ Just as before, they had forgotten about birth control, or they had counted off the days incorrectly; their carelessness had virtually begged for another pregnancy. The second time around, things run more smoothly. The woman by now is acquainted with the way the bureaucracy works, she is already experienced: she is there because she wants an abortion, and she does not have the air of simply a victim of an accident, struck by lightning from a cloudless sky. The discussion of birth control is carried out a bit more exhaustively by the social worker, the woman pays a bit less attention than before. She’s convinced it will not happen again, but she has started on her way, and the third abortion is statistically no less frequent than the second.
