Based on nationwide data collected by the National Center for Health Statistics and other sources, the researchers found that from 1994 through 2001, the rate of unplanned pregnancies increased by almost 30 percent for women below the federal poverty line -- now defined as $16,000 annually for a family of three. For women in families comfortably above poverty, the rate of unplanned pregnancies fell by 20 percent during the same period.

The abortion rate also rose among poor women while declining among the more affluent.

"Clearly, something is changing, and it doesn't bode well in terms of unplanned pregnancies and abortions for poor women, in particular," said Heather Boonstra, one of the authors of the report.

Hi, i hope this message gets to someone, anyway, my name is jane, i'm pregnant right now and i'm keeping my baby because i want it, but i'm still pro-choice. i appreciate you being the same and standing up for women, because not many people give two cents about women, not even other women, what a disgrace! anyways, i just wanted to say that maybe, you know, you don't have to argue that the pre-embryo, embryo, or fetus isn't a person in order to make abortion legit. It's apparently life, i considered a fertilized egg life, i mean, that is how everyone starts outs, especially if i want the pregnancy, if i lose the pregnancy, i'm going to feel like i lost a child. well, maybe the status of the unborn baby depends on how you feel, that's ok. but if i want the baby and someone tells me that it's not as important as someone that's already born, i'm going to be saddened by that. Of course, the woman should always be put before the baby, because if it weren't for her, the baby wouldn't even be here. people have to respect women, for they're the ones that have to use their bodies to bring babies to life. we are the only ones that can do that. if people want us to give birth, then they better respect us first. they better realize that we decide whether or not to have children and when, not god, or men, or another woman, i believe there's a god, but he/she doesn't force women to have babies. he/she is a just god that doesn't think men are better than women. it's a good thing pro-choice folks have common sense. but there're consequences to trivializing the life of the unborn. for example, if a someone causes the death of a woman's unborn baby, and the law doesn't consider the baby to be a person, then the person that killed the baby won't be punished the way he/she should be. the way i see it though, it's that it doesn't matter that the baby is a person, because it's inside and dependent on the woman's body for survival, therefore, the woman has the right to decide whether she wants to use her body to nourish and bring the baby to the world. It's her body. If she decides to have an abortion, then it is something she does that she sees fit with her own body, it's not like she went out and killed someone. However, only a woman has the right to decide whether or not to have an abortion. she cannot be forced to have an abortion. if another peron kills her fetus, accidentally or intentionally, except in the case of a consented abortion, then the person should be punished.

I'm really glad to see that the Guttmacher study is getting promoted here. The results of their study are incredibly important.

Politicizing reproductive health threatens our country's health. Unplanned pregnancies that result in births are associated with too many negative social and health impacts to list here. So we should all be concerned about politically-driven science because the effects of ideology in science will last longer than just the next election.

Across parties Americans share a sense of community, but we need to address how the denial of reproductive justice threatens all of our communities. This isn't just an African-American issue, or a Latino issue, nor is it just a woman's issue. The gender inequality created by this injustice limits women's freedoms beyond the right to an abortion: it limits her voice in the decisions that affect her and perpetuates an unequal society.

For anyone looking for more resources on this topic, The Opportunity Agenda and The National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health have another blog posting on this study up at the ACLU Reproductive Rights blog.

You can also check out a Fact Sheet on the Opportunity Agenda website.