Two recent reports released by Heartbeat International show a significant rise in the percentage of abortions done via chemical means: the abortion pill.
Heartbeat’s 2020 Life Trends Report shows the percentage of women using the abortion pill is steadily increasing, from 40 percent just a few years ago to more than 50 percent today.
Additionally, a new report written by Christa Brown LAS, BSN, RN, Director of Medical Impact for Heartbeat shows why. Brown states, “… it is often promised to be ‘less invasive,’ advertised by abortion providers as ‘more natural,’ and promoted as ‘an abortion in the privacy of your own home.’”
True Care Helps Women Know the Risks
Many women don’t know the abortion pill can create physical and emotional side-effects. And, like surgical abortions, a chemical abortion can cause regret. True Care provides information to patients through educational brochures and videos regarding abortion, including the abortion pill, and about abortion pill reversal (APR).
True Care needs to be the first name seen online when a woman from central Wyoming searches the internet for the abortion pill. There may not be a Planned Parenthood in our community any more, however, according to Brown’s article, abortion clinics are not the only place women can get these drugs. “In 2017, nearly half (47%) were provided at nonspecialized clinics offering a broader range of health care services or at physicians’ offices,” she writes.
Online Sales of Abortion Pills
Additionally, websites promote dispensing abortion pills by mail, and women are ordering these drugs. According to a July 2021 article on Politico, one website’s request for abortion pills
“jumped 27 percent from March 20 to April 11 last year…”
The Charlotte Lozier Institute released a report in 2018 about online sales of Mifeprex and Misoprostol for the purpose of DIY or at-home abortion. Their findings are shocking: 72 unique websites sell the abortion pill, 30 of which were abortion pill focused and 42 were online pharmacy sites. These discoveries are especially disturbing since the Federal Food and Drug Administration (FDA) at that time did not permit these drugs to be sent through the mail; such action was illegal. Sadly, earlier this year, the FDA relaxed its rules, thereby putting women at greater risk not only at their own hands, but also exposing them to potential harm by others.
For example, there has been more than one case of men ordering abortion pills and slipping the drugs into their pregnant partners’ drinks.
There is also the potential for not receiving ‘the right drugs’ – without oversight by a licensed physician, a woman cannot truly know what type of medication, or how much of that drug, is in the pills she orders and takes.
Additionally, complications, such as excessive bleeding, infection, unknown ectopic pregnancy, and incomplete abortion, have been known to occur. In 2019, Dr. Ingrid Skop, M.D., wrote an extensive article in the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons regarding chemical abortion. She points out various studies that show the rate of complications for medical abortions is four times higher than that of surgical abortions. Additionally, a woman may suspect she is six to seven weeks pregnant, but without the determination of gestational age via ultrasound, she may actually be 12, 15, or even 18 weeks pregnant. Chemical abortion is only an option for women who are 10 weeks or less.
Dr. Skop recognizes these concerns and others, including men attempting to kill the unborn child. ”Potential for misuse and coercion is high when there is no way to verify who is consuming the medication and whether she is doing so willingly. Sex traffickers, incestuous abusers, and coercive boyfriends will all welcome more easily available medical abortion,” she writes.
Telling the Truth
All of these dangerous risks are rarely talked about. Therefore, women aren’t likely to know the potential harm from a chemical abortion.
That’s where True Care comes in. We recently updated our patient website to inform women of the possible risks of the abortion pill. We’ve created an in-house brochure regarding those potential physical and emotional side-effects. Both of these endeavors have been approved by our medical director and are based on information from the Mayo Clinic.
Dr. Skop’s research article concludes, “Physicians who seek to advocate for their female patient’s best interests should become aware that medical abortion results in complications far more often than its proponents acknowledge.”
At True Care, we have opportunity to impact women with factual information they likely don’t know. We are on the front lines of this battle for life – for the physical life of the baby, but also for the physical, emotional, and spiritual life of the woman carrying that baby.
Thank you for being in this fight with us! Your prayers and financial support are vital to this war.