Thousands of teenage girls in Beijing have abortions each year, according to teenage sex clinics.
Sources with Beijing Tian'an Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine, the first in the capital to open a hotline for pregnant teenagers, said more than 100 teenage girls received abortions during the first three months of the year.
Of nearly 5,000 phone calls from teenagers, seven to eight percent are from unmarried girls asking about abortion. The proportion was only about five percent last year, said Deng Jun, a doctor with the teenager counseling service of Beijing No.2 Hospital.
"Girls who have abortions are considerably younger. Most of them are junior middle school students aged 14 to 15," said Deng, adding the youngest patient to come for an abortion was a 13-year-old and some girls had abortions many times.
"Two years ago, teenage pregnancy mainly happened to college and senior high school students," he said.
