Induced Abortion Does Not Seem to Predispose to Depression

In several studies, induced abortion has lacked major psychiatric consequences leading to hospitalization. These researchers linked Danish registries on 396,397 women to determine the patterns of a first outpatient antidepressant prescription (a proxy for new mild-to-moderate depression or anxiety) in women who underwent a first-time, first-trimester induced abortion (n=30,834) and those who carried a first pregnancy to term (n=85,592).

Compared with women who never had abortions, women who had first-time abortions had higher, similarly sized risks for a first antidepressant prescription in the year before abortion and the year afterward; risks then decreased during the next 4 years. Compared with women who never gave birth, women with term …