After reading's Razib's post on eugenics, I wandered what the trends are in approving of an abortion if there is a good chance of a birth defect. It turns out that support has been dropping for a decade. The percent approving went from 81.8% in 1996 to 72.9% in 2004. 2002-2004 was the biggest two year drop, and I'd be interested to see the 2006 numbers. The samples were all over 850 people, so the numbers should be fairly accurate. Of course, approval numbers are still high, but as genes moves front stage, we might see some backlash.
Its possible that approval of aborting defective fetuses may be do to the fact that fewer people who approve of this option are having kids. Thus, the pool of people who have an opinion on this issue, one way or the other, is dropping and those that remain are increasingly of those who do not approve of this option (e.g. that "Nature knows best" and that kids should be accepted "as is").
ReplyDeleteIt would be interesting to compare this data with surveys of people about if they accept PGD prior to IVF birth.