Catholic opponents of reproductive freedom for women remain fixated on the minority of cases of induced abortion, incurious about the vast majority of cases.
We do not know and we may never know how many conceptions are wasted. Some ovarian cysts, we do not know what proportion, are caused by the fertilization of ova which have failed to escape from the follicle. Until the microscopic examination of ovaries removed at surgery is undertaken as a matter of course, we shall continue to have no idea how common an event this is. Many ovarian cysts balloon up only to subside, possibly indicating the reabsorption of such pregnancies. Other kinds of early pregnancy wastage occur because the fertilized ovum fails to be gathered into the fallopian tube and wanders off into the peritoneal cavity to be eventually reabsorbed. A commoner and much more mysterious kind of early pregnancy wastage is caused by a “shortened luteal phase”. In a normal pregnancy the ruptured follicle changes into the corpus luteum which secretes the progesterone needed for the maintenance of the pregnancy and the suppression of further ovulation; if conception does not occur the corpus luteum is shed at menstruation. If the luteal phase is accelerated, the process of sloughing begins before the fertilized ovum has a chance to implant in the uterus wall. Women who suffer from this kind of infertility are, in fact, habitual aborters.
Germaine Greer
Sex and Destiny The Politics of Human Fertility
Tumba Lata 