ng is rarely effective.

Those tempted to use these drugs should realize the futility of the
practice for the purpose intended and the frequency with which
disturbances of health are caused by taking them.

Their only value is as a lucrative source of gain to those people who,
knowing their inefficacy, yet exploit the distress of certain women by
selling them.

It is perfectly clear that the real menace is the instrumentally
produced abortion, either self-induced by the person herself or the
result of an illegal operation performed by some outside person.

These abortionists include a few unprincipled doctors and chemists, a
few women with varying degrees of nursing training, and a number of
unskilled people.

It was a matter of considerable importance for the Committee to attempt
to determine first the extent to which spontaneous abortions contribute
to the total figures: the prevalence of unlawful abortion could then be
better realized.

Here again it was found exceedingly difficult to obtain exact figures,
but the evidence suggests that probably less than seven pregnancies in
every 100 terminate in spontaneous abortion.

Taking the records of one group of 1,095 women where the incentives to
interference were probably at a minimum, it was found that out of a
total of 2,180 pregnancies only 152, or 6.97 per cent., terminated in
abortion, while in a series of 5,337 pregnancies in patients taken from
the records of St. Helens Hospitals, 6 per cent. terminated in
abortion.

Even assuming that _all_ these were spontaneous (which was probably not
the case), the incidence is approximately 6 per cent. to 7 per cent.

If, then, the total abortion rate is 20 per 100, it is clear that the
incidence of criminal abortion is at least 13 in every 100 pregnancies.

The Committee believes that this figure can be accepted as a
conservative estimate of the prevalence of unlawful abortion in New
Zealand. Some of the figures presented suggested a still higher
incidence.

Applying the figures given to the whole of New Zealand it means that
while in the year ending March, 1936, there were 24,395 live births
there were probably 6,066 abortions, of which nearly two-thirds (4,000)
were criminally induced.

The impression of the Committee is that this is an underestimate.

Serious as this is on general grounds, the matter is of particular
importance in regard to the special problem which led to the setting-up
of this Committee