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The Director of Central Intelligence

Wuhiryron, D.C, 20j05

National Intelligence Council

IC 01705-84 14 March l9B4

I'IEI4ORANDUM FOR:

Deputy Director
FROM: He

Director of Central Intelligence of centr^al Intelligence chairman, National Intelligence counc.i I

rbe rt E . Meye r Vice Chairman, National Intelligence Council

Abo nt i

SU tsJ ECT :

ons i n the Sovi et

l oc:

what They

Mean

I . Romani a 's Ni col ai ceausescu J ast week reported in a wide'ly publicized speech that of 742,000 recorded pregnancies in 1983, 4?a,000 u,ere aborted. This works out to an official abortion rate of 57%. S'i nce it is inevitable that solne pregnanci es went unrecorded that were I ater aborted, the real percentage must be higher.

figures on the Soviet Unior, I checked with is the Hest's leading soviet-b'loc demographer. stimates that the abortion rate for the ussR as a who'li ii beiween 60% and 70%. Anrong slavs and Balts, wfo comprise g0% of the soviet population, the abortion rate is 75% to B0%.'
companable

or

h9 as you know

According to a Soviet medica1 journal pubtished in July lgg3, a survey of 400 women in Russia's Tambov oblast--women who had iad at-least oni induced abortion--showed that these women had each unaergone between one and 28 abortions, with s% of the women undergoing 1l-or more abort i ons.

3. In the United States, the abortion rate is 30%. 4. I don't think we can attribute these staggering Sov'iet-bloc abortion rates.entirely to.the low quality of available birth-control products and to decis'ions by sensible, practical parents to limit the size of their families simply because their apartments 'lack. sufficient floor space for comfort. Rather, I believe that we should view these abortion rates, at least partly, as an indication of the average couple's judgment on life in communist societies. Indeed, these abortion rates reflect a vision of the future that is bleak and despairing aimost to the point of nationa'l suicide.

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5. The above forthcoming NIE on

political

statistics

and their implications will be addressed and economlc pressures within the ussR.

in

our

6. since these statistics all are public, you may wish to make them available to policymakers for use in their own public statenents.
STAT
,

cc:

I 0/USSR-

EE

A/NI0/USSR-EE Nrc/AG

STAT

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STAT

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