In 2014, the abortion rate in the United States was 14.6 abortions per 1,000 women. This is the lowest abortion rate recorded since Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court ruling that legalized abortion in the United States in 1973. One fear of the decision was that it would lead to an increase in abortions and that terminating pregnancies could have a detrimental effect on women who have abortions. Although increasing access to legal abortion has seen an increase in abortions, a study published in JAMA Psychiatry found that legal abortions did not cause a significant increase in mental health problems among women who underwent abortions. With a long history of trauma and disease causing premature deaths at extraordinary rates, humans have evolved to overcome trauma. Humans are inherently resilient, largely due to the high amount of traumatic experiences our ancestors experienced and the genes dedicated to survival that have been passed down from generation to generation. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay It is not unreasonable to believe that abortions can have a serious impact on women's mental health. Terminating a pregnancy and losing an unborn child can be a traumatic experience that could have long-term effects on your mental health. A study published in JAMA Psychiatry followed 1,000 women who sought abortion counseling. The study followed these women for five years after they received or were denied an abortion. The researchers found that those who had abortions were no more likely than those who were denied abortions to experience anxiety, depression, low self-esteem, or feelings of dissatisfaction with life. Only those who were denied an abortion because they were too far along in their pregnancy experienced negative mental health issues, but the study noted that after six months, negative mental health effects returned to the range seen in other groups in the study . The study shows that humans are extremely resilient and that we often manage to overcome even the most difficult events that may occur in our lives. Modern life is much safer and less trauma-burdened than our past, where mortality rates across the board were much higher. In evolutionary terms, it makes sense that we are as resilient as we are, considering we wouldn't otherwise exist. For obvious reasons, there are no concrete statistics on mortality rates from our ancient past, but they are believed to be extraordinarily high compared to today, where the global average life expectancy is 71 years. The infant mortality rate, in particular, is believed to have been very high in prehistoric times. Even in recent times, before the advent of standard hygiene rules in hospitals, infant mortality rates were much higher than today. Hungarian physician Ignaz Semmelweis observed in 1846 that the neonatal mortality rate was five times lower when women gave birth in a maternity clinic than when births occurred in hospitals by male doctors. He found that doctors performed autopsies in hospitals and midwives did not. Semmelweis hypothesized that harmful microbes were transferred from autopsy bodies to women who gave birth. When Semmelweis advised doctors to sterilize their hands and instruments before delivering babies, the neonatal mortality rate dropped dramatically. Today it is very rare for a baby to be lost during birth, but even in the last century neonatal deaths would not have been so rare. Modern medicine has reduced.