Abortion and childlessness

In the next two generations, our natural population is projected to halve, a decline driven largely by increasing childlessness. Current projections suggest that more than 25% of women reaching age 45 in the next 20 years, will do so without having children, and abortion plays a role in about half of these cases.

Demographers have uncovered a previously unstated risk that if a woman is childless at age 30, there is a 50% chance that she will remain childless at age 45. This is important because fertility for women under 30 has collapsed—and it is not being made up later. Data from the Office for National Statistics show that, in the last fifty years or more, fertility remains largely the same for women in their 30s and 40s, no catch-up births, resulting in the year-on-year decline in total fertility rate, from highs of over 2.4 to the current 1.4.

Abortion at age 29 carries a 50% risk of childlessness

In an essay, The Impact of Abortion on Childlessness, first published by Christian Concern[i], I explore the link between abortion and childlessness. Using insights from demographer Stephen J Shaw, I show how we can decompose total fertility rate into its constituent parts, children per mother and total childlessness rate. Focusing on those women who remain childless at age 30, I show that about half have done so by ending an earlier pregnancy by abortion. Then applying the risk stated by Shaw et al, I show that women who remain childless at age 30 because they chose abortion, have a 50% chance of remaining childless at age 45.

In 2022, about 5,500 childless women became pregnant when aged 29 and chose to end that pregnancy by abortion. Applying the risk factor for women childless at 30 remaining childless at 45, I project that in 2022, 2,800 childless 29 year olds who had an abortion will sadly remain childless by age 45, never having a child.

My contention is that providers are not disclosing this risk to women when obtaining their consent for the abortion. I am not suggesting that abortion causes infertility. But if an abortion leaves a woman childless at 30, she will then find herself where timing pressures and the natural decline of fertility come into play—resulting in a 50/50 chance she will still be childless at 45.

“Despite their reputation as ‘pro-choice’, abortion providers fail to give women the full picture of what the choice to abort will mean for them in the long term. How many women would make different decisions if they knew of the 50/50 chance that they would never have children?”

Andrea Williams, chief executive of Christian Concern.

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[i] Redfearn, S. (2025, November 10). Women accessing abortion not told of the risk they would remain childless – Christian Concern. Christian Concern. https://christianconcern.com/news/women-accessing-abortion-not-told-risk-childless/