level 1 question: What are the impacts of cultural values and laws on the abortion rate?

Similar to abortion laws, cultural values are ideal for reducing the number of abortion cases in any country. This is because, based on culture, doing abortion draws diverse emotions due to the difference in personal and societal beliefs. In developing countries, most women who seek abortion services have a high rate of stigma as well as a social exclusion in their society (Loll & Hall, 2019). Countries in which abortion laws are established sideline such people from society. Thus, it is useful to understand the perception in society in line with abortion, which is key in forming the design, delivery, and intervention that can wage out the gaps that will oversee safe abortion in women. Additionally, the cultural values laid in a community are heterogeneous, which shows that they might vary with the gender, occupation as well as position that one has in the society. Cultural laws and values that see abortion as a crime might lead to a rise in stigma as well as a hostile abortion environment, which is a way of limiting people’s access to safe abortion services. However, abortion might come with negative consequences, thus calling for a need for strengthening the community-based approach in bringing upon an enabling environment that will oversee the follow-up of laws set up in performing unsafe abortion (Clarke & Mühlrad, 2021). Some communities leverage the existence of abortion cases by imposing harsh penalties on those who cause harm to the child through abortion. Though this reduces abortion, it increases pregnancy rates hence a rise in population. Abortion laws hence significantly reduce the impact of individuals’ engagement in abortion attitudes.

Level 2 question. What cultural values are linked to the laws that restrict abortion

Culturally, the laws that prevent abortion reduce the rate at which abortion occurs. For instance, the catholic, orthodox, and several evangelical churches support laws that put abortion a crime. Cultural values, such as disapproval under all circumstances for abortion as well as maintaining the status of the fetus, are things that prohibit abortion. More so, based on the issue related to cultural relativism, people’s belief in abortion is what makes it morally wrong or morally justifiable (Blysta et al., 2020). Values such as the child’s right and the right to life for each person have been in the limelight in ensuring that there is no reckless abortion. There have been changes in the abortion status and attitude toward abortion, especially in the United States. Cross-cultural results show that abortion is traditionally accepted if the mother does not need the pregnancy or the pregnancy is seen as unacceptable in society, as in the cases of incest. This shows that across all cultures, the most prevalent conditions unto which abortion can be accepted might not be limited to adultery or ambiguous paternity. This can also go hand in hand with the mother’s health and the father’s consent (Harries & Constant, 2020). Recently, the rate of abortion in cultures that highly value children has reduced to around seventy per one thousand women as compared to areas where there are no abortion laws which corresponds to three hundred abortions per one thousand women. More so, cultural laws linked to abortion are associated with religious laws and abortion attitudes, which depict the understanding and the scripture interpretation. In most cultures, the sanctity placed on the sacredness of life brings along a central view on abortion. For instance, most cultures believe that each person has been created in God’s image hence the need to protect life (Watson, 2022). As a result, practicing abortion means ending a life which might go against most cultural views on when life begins and how one starts to bear God’s image.

Ethical perspective