健康英语新闻:Single migrant women face high abortion risk

Currently, the top three channels to get contraceptive information in China are the Internet, reproductive health education materials and magazines, it found.

However, up to 88 percent of the respondents still expressed confusion about contraceptive methods. Condoms and oral contraceptives are the most widely used kinds.

About half the respondents said they had acquaintances facing unintended pregnancies and during the past year, 44 percent of the females surveyed had taken morning after pills. Among single women suffering failed birth control, 39 percent used the rhythm method or withdrawal, nearly 33 percent used condoms, and about 19 percent took morning after pills.

A doctor surnamed Fang with the Beijing Obstetrics and Gynecology Hospital said: "We had from time to time teenage girls having an abortion who had little knowledge of contraception."

As with most Asians, the biggest obstacle for the Chinese to obtain such knowledge is that they are shy talking about sex in public and don't usually have sex education in school, said Qin Guoying, secretary-general of the China Women's Development Foundation.

To address the issue, the foundation formed an alliance with the CMA, with funding support from Germany-based pharmaceutical company Bayer, to pilot post-abortion care (PAC) in China.

PAC is a worldwide strategy to address abortion problems by treating women with complications and providing family planning knowledge to prevent future abortions.

As of 2001, more than 40 countries worldwide were using PAC, which has lowered repeated induced abortions by 25 to 50 percent, international studies show.

According to Cheng, well-trained nurses in gynecology and obstetrics departments are best-suited to deliver the service.

After an induced abortion, women are kept for medical observation for a while and nurses can approach them to disseminate the information, she said.