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According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), there is estimated to be around 73 million induced abortions annually worldwide. This estimate corresponds to approximately 200,000 abortions per day. This would make abortion a leading cause of global deaths in 2025, as it would outnumber other causes of death by a wide margin. In 2025, cancer accounted for an estimated 10 million deaths, smoking-related illnesses for 6.2 million, infectious diseases for 17 million, and HIV/AIDS for about two million.
This estimate is based on WHO data compiled by the global statistics site Worldometers. According to the WHO fact sheet, the global abortion rate is approximately 39 per 1,000 women aged 15 to 49 each year. The data also indicate that about 61 per cent of the estimated 121 million unintended pregnancies annually result in abortion.
According to the latest annual report from the Ministry of Health, 17,785 unborn babies were terminated by abortion procedures in New Zealand in 2024. This is a 9.3 per cent increase from 2023 figures (16,277 abortions reported in 2023). In real terms, this means four more babies a day were aborted in 2024 than in the year prior, with around 50 children a day now being killed in the womb.
Specifically, the latest NZ abortion figures highlighted the following:
- 164 of those abortions happened at OVER 20 weeks’ gestation (an increase from the year before)
- 389 abortions resulted in complications that were recorded on the day of the abortion (an increase from the year before)
- 7 weeks and under is now the most common gestation at which abortions are performed
- 20–24-year-olds were the age group that accessed the most abortions
- 11,892 – 67 per cent of all abortions were EMAs (an increase from 10,047 EMAs reported in 2023). Early medical abortions are up to 10 weeks gestation, and use abortion pills that may be accessed by telephone and couriered or posted to the women to allow them to have an abortion at home without medical supervision.
Unsurprisingly, the WHO and our MOH continue to report these figures as a common health intervention, effectively normalizing the killing of unborn babies and downplaying the severity of this rise in abortions both locally and globally. This is concerning and deeply alarming and a reminder of the critical importance of persisting in our efforts to protect the unborn.
This article was originally published by Family First New Zealand.
