Female feticide explains dearth of girls in India

About 10 million female fetuses may have been aborted in India over the past two decades. A team of scientists who analysed female fertility figures from a national survey of 6 million people in India found that there were about half a million fewer girls born in the country in 1997 than expected. Extrapolated over 20 years, the figure would be 10 million. It was found that selective abortion of female fetuses is the most plausible explanation for the skewed sex ratio. Researchers from the University of Toronto in Canada estimate that prenatal sex determination and selective abortion account for 0.5 million missing girls yearly. The figure of 10 million missing female births is not unreasonable if this practice has been common for the past two decades since access to ultrasound become widespread. The findings support estimates by the Indian Medical Association, which states that five million female fetuses are killed in India each year. The researchers found that the sex of the previous child was a determining factor in whether a female fetus was aborted. Fewer females are born as second and third children if the first child in a family is a girl. It was found that lack of girls as a second or third child is more pronounced in educated, rather than illiterate, women. To have a daughter is socially and emotionally accepted if there is a son, but a daughter's arrival is often unwelcome if the couple already have a daughter. Fetal sex determination and medical termination of pregnancy based on the sex of the fetus have been illegal since 1994, but there is published evidence of rampant female feticide in India where daughters are regarded as a liability. The study emphasizes the need for routine, reliable and long-term measurement of births and deaths.