We westerners like to think sex-selection is an Asian problem.  We tell ourselves that girls are being aborted in the millions because of China’s one-child policy.  But if there is one thing the reader takes away from Mara Hvistendahl’s ground breaking book, Unnatural Selection: Choosing Boys Over Girls, and the Consequences of a World Full of Men, is that sex selection is not just an Chinese problem.  It is prevalent in other Asian nations without a one-child policy, like India.

And it is spreading into Europe.

Hvistendahl warned us of skewed sex ratios in Albania and other Balkan countries. A LifeSiteNews report indicates that the West is finally taking notice of Albania’s problem with sex-selection:

The Council of Europe has revealed that sex-selective abortion is widely practiced in Albania and the result is a growing gulf between the numbers of boys and the number of girls. Recent statistics show that for every 100 Albanian girls 112 boys are born. In natural demographic growth, the number of girls usually slightly exceeds the number of boys.

The Council of Europe warns that sex-selection, once associated mainly with Asian countries, has become popular in Europe, particularly in Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia.

“Traditionally Albanian families have favoured boys over girls for two main reasons: the inheritance of the family name and the prospect of boys growing up to become breadwinners,” a 2005 report by the UN Development Programme (UNDP) said.

Abortion in Albania was legalized in 1995 after the fall of the communist government. It is now available on demand up to the 12th week of pregnancy.

That ratio of 112 boys to 100 girls is as bad as any Asian nation.

Progressives want to blame the culture for prizing boys over girls but the real problem has always been abortion.  It is the legalized abortion that is making missing a Y chromosome such a dangerous prospect in so many of the world’s cultures.

In fact, it is legalized abortion that makes any cultural bias deadly.  Once scientists claim to find the “obesity gene” those American fetuses predisposed to being fat adults better pray they have a pro-life mother.  When it is announced, whether accurately or not, that sexual preference can be discovered in the womb, then any fetuses that might possibly be homosexual better hope their parents believe in the sanctity of every human life.

Of course, our Western culture has already permitted a prenatal seek-and-destroy mission against anyone who has a genetic disease or disorder.  And we already know that the majority of Planned Parenthood clinics are in minority neighborhoods.

It is time for the world to realize that no matter what the culture, abortion magnifies whatever bigotry festers in society.  We cannot ensure protection for girls, or any other “undesirable” until abortion, the greatest destroyer of innocent human life, is brought to an end.