The absence of agreement on the ethical legitimacy of abortion does not entail the impossibility of finding a consensus on the best policy on abortion. This consensus is affordable because nobody doubts that, regarding the methods of birth control, contraception is better than abortion, abortion is better than infanticide and abortion is worse the later and the less safe it is performed. Because the complete elimination of abortion is not possible, the most relevant realistic political objectives that can be proposed are reducing the abortion rate, reducing the gestational age of abortions and making the remaining abortions safer. Restrictive policies do not contribute to lowering the abortion rate while are associated with unsafe abortions and higher women's morbidity and mortality. Copyright (C) 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.