Talk:aborticide

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aborticide

I'm not sure this is a word at all. The word construction seems very questionable. Usually the -icide/-cide suffix refers to the killing of what precedes it. Ie homicide killing of human, regicide killing of regent, matricide killing of mother, patricide killing of forther. The term feticide seems like the sensible means of referring to killing a fetus. Aborticide sounds like it would mean the killing of abortion... so it is derived in a totally different way that smacks of nonsense and something born in urban dictionaries. It's listed as a medical term, but where is it in medical usage? I'm not the most well read so if someone knows, I'll be glad to find it in a medical textbook or paper, but I don't know how. A page for the plural form aborticides is also there, it would share whatever fate the main gets I imagine. I haven't tagged it for that reason.

To find more detail I checked the history. It's been around since 2002 where the IP submitter claimed it was in a 1913 Webster's dictionary. I don't have one on hand to tell if this is true. Another suggested that this was directly derived from Latin terms, a questionable claim. Regardless of whether or not the term is notable enough in slang to persist (it's gotten some UD attention), the 'medicine' tag is highly questionable. Evidence that it's been used in the medical field would be needed, otherwise change term to slang I think.

Wikipedia:aborticide was deleted, for example, when someone directed it to abortion. Someone has put it on FreeDictionary though the supposed Wikipedia article it quotes actually redirects to the article on abortifacient suggesting a different proposed use too, though I'd similarly question the validity of that. I'm not sure if TFD would be considered a valid source, I don't think it gives evidence of the word having existed or being used in medicine. Dictabeard 23:29, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

It's trivially verifiable as existing via Google Books. The New Sydenham Society's lexicon of medicine and the allied sciences offers a definition[1], "The destruction of the foetus in utero to effect delivery.", so it's obviously been used in a medical sense, as well as a politicized sense.--Prosfilaes 23:55, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

I get 439 raw Google Books hits, so it must mean something. Mglovesfun (talk) 23:58, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

It is not restricted to a medical context, so I removed the context tag. DCDuring TALK 17:19, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

Seems cited to me. DCDuring TALK 17:22, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

• RFV passed. Ƿidsiþ 10:12, 20 April 2011 (UTC)