NATIONAL CHERYL SULLENGER JAN 6, 2020 | 12:01PM WASHINGTON, DC

from LifeNews.com

A total of 36 abortion facilities closed nationwide in 2019, according to a survey of every abortion facility in the U.S. conducted by Operation Rescue.

While the number of closures shows that in certain areas, abortion suppliers have outstripped the demand, as abortion numbers and rates continue to drop nationwide, according to the Center for Disease Control.

Other noteworthy facts were revealed by Operation Rescue’s survey.

· Since 2013, 367 surgical abortion facilities have permanently closed.

· This year’s closures represent a staggering 79 percent drop in the number of surgical abortion facilities nationwide since 1991, when there were 2,176 surgical abortion facilities.

· There was a net gain of nine U.S. abortion clinics in 2019.

· Planned Parenthood doubled down as a supplier of abortion-inducing drugs by opening five new pill clinics, dropping surgical abortions from five others, and adding chemical abortion availability to 14 of its centers that previously did not conduct abortions.

Methodology

Each year, Operation Rescue conducts a nationwide survey that involves contact with each abortion business in the U.S. The information gathered about the abortion clinics and their practices represents the most accurate data available.

This most recent data was compiled by Operation Rescue, which conducted a survey of all abortion facilities in the U.S. from November 18 through December 6, 2019.

Operation Rescue defines “abortion clinics” as those businesses that conduct abortions outside a hospital setting. There are two categories of abortion clinics:

· Surgical Abortion Clinics: These offices conduct surgical abortions. Almost always, surgical facilities also distribute abortion-inducing drugs.

· Medical Abortion Clinics: These offices supply abortions through the administration of drugs (pills) or other chemical means. They do not conduct surgical abortions.

Abortion facility totals

· 

Today, there are a total of 710 U.S. abortion facilities, up nine facilities from 2018’s record low of 701.

In 2019, new abortion facility openings slightly outpaced closures.

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However, the number of surgical abortion clinics continues to decline with seven fewer today than last year at this time, hitting a record low of 464.

In fact, the number of surgical abortion clinics has fallen each year for at least the past decade from 713 in 2009 to just 464 in 2019. That represents a decrease of 35 percent over the last ten years.

“The decline in surgical abortion facilities is terrible news for the Abortion Cartel, but great news for women and their babies,” said Troy Newman, President of Operation Rescue. “Surgical abortion facilities are still the most profitable, especially if they conduct abortions past the first trimester when prices – and profits – really soar. When they shut down it saves lives and takes money out of the pockets of the abortionists.”

But when it comes to medication abortion facilities that are dispensaries for abortion-inducing drugs, those clinic numbers have steadily increased.

Today, there are 245 abortion pill facilities – an increase of 15 clinics nationwide in 2019.

Medication abortion facility numbers have been steadily on the rise over the past decade, increasing 47 percent in the past ten years.

Notable Closures

Clinic Latina, Phoenix, Arizona — It’s likely that most people have never heard of the Clinic Latina in Phoenix, Arizona, but its abortionist, Ronald Yunis, made news October 10, 2019, when he was arrested on outside another facility where he also conducted abortions, the Acacia Women’s Center. Pro-life activists had taken video of Yunis pulling a gun on one activist as he left the clinic’s driveway. Police investigated and later arrested Yunis. It was after his arrest that the Clinic Latina stopped conducting abortions.

San Diego Women’s Medical Clinic, San Diego, California – This facility owner, Michael Wong, who conducted abortions over the better part of four decades, finally stopped in 2019.

Her Medical Clinic, Pacoima, California – After years of pro-life outreach at this run-down abortion mill, Her Medical Clinic has finally closed. Operation Rescue’s staff has memories of public outreach at this facility and praying for its closure dating back over twenty-five years.

American Women’s Services affiliates in Baltimore, Cheverly, and Silver Spring, Maryland – These three chemical abortion facilities were owned by the disgraced New Jersey abortionist Steven Chase Brigham. The reason for their closure is cloaked in mystery. These facilities once conducted surgical abortions, but were halted from continuing to do so in 2013, after it was discovered that they were illegally administering misoprostol to women without a licensed physician present. The Baltimore facility was the site of the death of Maria Santiago, 38, who stopped breathing, then suffered cardiac arrest after an abortion on February 13, 2013. No one at the clinic, including abortionist Iris E. Dominy, had current CPR certification. A crash cart in the hallway was not used and the defibrillator was broken.

States

This year, Rhode Island became the seventh state with just one abortion facility. Those seven states are Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, North Dakota, Rhode Island, South Dakota, and West Virginia.

In all of those states, the last open clinics are surgical abortion facilities. Three are operated by Planned Parenthood, while the other four are independent abortion businesses.

Abortion clinic numbers increased in twelve states over the past year, while there were fewer abortion facilities in nine states. Thirty states, including the District of Columbia, had no net change in the number of abortion clinics.

The states with the largest increase in abortion clinics were New York and New Jersey, which both added four facilities. This is likely due to the liberalization of abortion laws – including the repeal of safety regulations – in those two states.

There were nine states in which abortion facility numbers decreased. The states with the largest decrease in abortion clinics were Massachusetts and Maryland, where both states’ clinic totals fell by three facilities. Financial considerations appeared to have caused the decrease in Massachusetts, while in Maryland, three abortion pill clinics operated by the disgraced New Jersey abortionist Steven Chase Brigham inexplicably halted operations.

In Kansas City, Kansas, Planned Parenthood Great Plains was thwarted from opening a new surgical abortion facility when the pro-life group Planned Parenthood Exposed, led by local activist Ron Kelsey, persuaded a landlord to cancel a signed contract with Planned Parenthood.

Planned Parenthood

Of the 710 abortion facilities currently open for business, 381, or 54 percent, are Planned Parenthood facilities. Planned Parenthood operates 170 surgical abortion facilities and 211 medication abortion-only clinics – the vast majority of that type of facility currently in operation.

In all, Planned Parenthood opened 21 new abortion sites in 2019. Three were surgical abortion facilities while 18 were “new” medication abortion clinics. Of those eighteen, 14 were existing referral clinics that added abortion drug availability.

While Planned Parenthood operates more facilities than independently owned clinics, it is the independent clinics that still conduct the most abortions, according to a report published by the Abortion Care Network.

That report claims that Planned Parenthood conducts 37 percent of abortions in the U.S. while independent clinics conduct 58 percent — with fewer facilities. However, when compared to 2018 figures from the same source, this indicates that Planned Parenthood gained two percent of the total abortion market share in 2019.

Despite Planned Parenthood’s modest growth in 2019, there are still seven states that have no Planned Parenthood abortion facility.

Impact of state legislation

In all, nine states passed pro-abortion legislation in 2019.

Those states include California, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, and Vermont.

Of the nine states, three states experienced an increase in abortion facilities three states recorded a decrease due to a rise in the number of medical abortion facilities. Three states saw no change.

It usually takes time for legislation passed on the state level to have an impact, especially if the enactment of new laws are delayed by challenges in court, as is the case with most pro-life legislation.

However, New York’s new abortion law that eliminated safety regulations and reduced clinic accountability had an immediate impact that was perhaps unexpected by state lawmakers.

“The impact of these pro-abortion laws so far has been an increase in the number of botched abortions that require ambulance transport from abortion facilities. These laws are lowing safety standards and, in turn, hurting women in order to increase abortion profits for chains like Planned Parenthood,” said Newman.

That is particularly true in New York where, for example, Planned Parenthood’s flagship abortion facility, the Margaret Sanger Planned Parenthood in Manhattan has increased the number of known calls for ambulance transport from three in 2018 to thirteen in 2019.

On the other hand, 17 states passed pro-life laws in, 2019, but with most of the new laws tied up in legal challenges, including gestational abortion limits in nine states.

Those states include Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Utah, and Wyoming.

Out of those states, all but five saw no change in the number of abortion facilities.

Nevertheless, pro-life legislation passed in previous years continues to contribute to clinic closures and is providing necessary road-blocks to keep the rapid expansion of abortion chains in check nationwide.

Protect Life Rule

In a significant move, the Department of Health and Human Services enacted the Protect Life Rule in the spring of 2019, which prevents clinics that conduct or refer for abortions from receiving Title X family planning grants. It is estimated that this rule will deprive Planned Parenthood of $60 million annually in taxpayer funding.

At least four states have stepped in to replace the Title X grant money from their state coffers. Those states are Illinois, New Jersey, New York, and Vermont. The cities of Austin, Texas, and New York City gave a total of $400,000 to keep abortion facilities open.

Nevertheless, the Protect Life Rule may have been at least partially responsible for the closure of 23 Planned Parenthood centers that did not conduct abortions. That has the benefit of reducing Planned Parenthood’s reach and ability to market abortions into communities where those referral clinics no longer exist.

What’s behind the increase in chemical abortions?

The rise in the number of abortion facilities in 2019 is attributable to several factors, including an effort by abortion businesses to increase sales of abortion drugs, which are easier and cheaper to offer than surgical abortions.

Other abortion chains, including Carafem, the Texas-based Whole Women’s Health, and the California-based FPA Women’s Health have expanded their clinics that only offer abortion drugs.

Planned Parenthood has continued to expand into the chemical abortion business in three ways.

Conversion of 14 referral centers into abortion pill dispensaries.

Slowly expanding webcam abortion services into areas where they are still allowed. (They are restricted or banned in 20 states).

Experimenting with a new scheme in the Pacific Northwest and elsewhere to distribute abortion drugs through the U.S. Postal Service with the assistance of a smart phone app, as Operation Rescue’s research earlier this year explains. Currently that app is not available to the public.

Earlier this year, Planned Parenthood introduced a smart phone app to the public that can be used to obtain birth control pills. It is possible that at some point, Planned Parenthood will be able to use that platform to distribute abortion drugs through the mail, as their experimental program seems to indicate.

This is a matter that requires vigilance and new, proactive legislation to protect women and babies as Planned Parenthood aggressively seeks new ways to expand abortion nationwide.

As Operation Rescue reported in an exposé earlier this year, there is a huge profit margin in providing abortion drugs. Planned Parenthood pays about $82 for the mifepristone/misoprostol abortion drug combination, but sells them for a huge mark-up at an average of $604 at their abortion pill clinics around the country.

The profit margin for the app-to-mailbox scheme is even greater because women need not ever visit a Planned Parenthood clinic to obtain abortion-inducing drugs.

The pill-by-mail scheme would be one way to circumvent pro-life trigger laws that would ban abortion in many states should Roe v. Wade be overturned – something that appears likely should President Trump win re-election and/or be afforded additional Supreme Court picks.

Conclusions

Abortion businesses are desperately attempting to expand into untapped markets in order to stay solvent in a time when the overall demand for abortion has decreased. Profitable medication abortions have been the focus of this attempted expansion.

Operation Rescue’s survey found, however, that most clinics that only provide chemical abortions tend to be part-time facilities, whereas surgical facilities have more abortion days available. For example, the survey found that some abortion pill clinics are only open to dispense abortion drugs as infrequently as once a month.

Surgical abortion facilities, which tend to be busier clinics, require more overhead to operate and are more costly to staff and equip. That may explain why the number of surgical abortion facilities has fallen each year over the past decade while medication clinics have increased.

Clinic closures in 2019 were generally due to the following reasons:

Financial problems.

Abortionists who quit or retire and cannot be replaced.

Pro-life legislation and/or activism.

Criminal conduct and/or regulatory violations.

“Planned Parenthood received massive funding in 2019 through private donations and state and federal disbursements. This enabled it to dive headlong into the abortion pill market, expanding into twenty-one new locations,” said Newman. “However, that number would have been much worse, had it not been for tough pro-life legislation and vigilant activists all across the nation.”

Newman concluded, “The closer we get to ending abortion in America, the harder the Abortion Cartel will fight against our efforts. The increase in abortion facilities and attempts to use alternate methods of dispensing abortion drugs is an indicator that the Abortion Cartel has stepped up their game, sensing the end for them is near. Our side cannot afford complacency, especially as we enter a critical presidential election year that will determine whether our national policies favor greedy abortionists or the protection of babies in the womb. The outcome of that election – as well as the fate of millions of innocent lives that hang in the balance – will be up to us.”

LifeNews.com Note: Cheryl Sullenger is a leader of Operation Rescue.

The Abortion Pill is Not Like Tylenol and Parents Should Know if Minors Obtain It

 By Nancy Flanders |  September 2, 2020

The abortion industry is highly skilled at marketing its “services,” changing tactics to suit various situations. From “safe, legal, and rare” to simply “legal,” pro-abortion businesses and organizations frequently change their terminology. In one recent example, the abortion pill has been compared at least twice to Tylenol, but in very different ways.

Some claim the abortion pill is “safer than Tylenol”

Former Planned Parenthood CEO Cecile Richards wrote an op-ed in the Los Angeles Times in 2018 in which she erroneously claimed, “There is no medical or health reason for [a] ban on medication abortion. Approved by the Food and Drug Administration in 2000, non-invasive medication abortion is safe by all measures — safer than Tylenol and Viagra, even.”

What Richards neglected to mention is that the abortion pill  carries risks of abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, headache, heavy bleeding, and maternal death — all of which can happen when taking the prescribed dosage on just one occasion. Additionally, the abortion pill can fail and lead to follow-up surgical abortions. Some women have died from infection or undiagnosed ectopic pregnancies after taking the abortion pill.

For these reasons, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has specific safety regulations in place (REMS) which require one of the two drugs in the abortion pill regimen (mifepristone) to be dispensed by a certified prescriber at an approved hospital or clinic. (Some of these requirements have been suspended during COVID-19, a decision which the FDA is actively opposing.)

Tylenol is an over-the-counter medication which is not subject to REMS.

The abortion pill is clearly not safer than Tylenol.

Others claim the abortion pill is really “not the same as taking a Tylenol”

Yet this week in response to Florida House Bill 265, which requires that minors have written consent from their legal guardian for an abortion, pro-choice Generation Action board member Emma Moses said that the abortion pill is actually “not the same as taking a Tylenol” so that she could argue that a minor taking the abortion pill should not be forced to tell her parents, despite any safety risks.

She’s right, but perhaps not in the way she thinks. There are consequences to taking the abortion pill that are dangerous, yet Moses argues that telling parents that their child is taking the abortion pill is what puts girls in a “really dangerous” situation. That argument is misguided.

In reality, withholding that information from a minor’s parents could be dangerous because girls taking it could suffer major complications, including death. If a girl’s parents are unaware that she has taken the abortion pill, they cannot properly communicate with emergency responders. Additionally, a teen could potentially be a victim of sexual abuse by a teacher, an uncle, or a coach. Informing her parents about the abortion could be the one window of opportunity to save her from the abuse.

The abortion pill is not safer than Tylenol, as was claimed by Planned Parenthood’s former president.

Yet, despite the difference in safety, the major difference between Tylenol and the abortion pill is that only one exists solely to end the life of a human being.

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National Micaiah Bilger Oct 16, 2019 | 3:14PM Washington, DC

A federal judge permanently blocked an Obama administration rule Tuesday that could have forced medical facilities and doctors to abort unborn babies.

The rule from President Barack Obama’s Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) defined “discrimination on the basis of sex” to include abortion in Obamacare. In doing so, it could have forced medical facilities, doctors, nurses and other medical workers to abort unborn babies against their beliefs.

On Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor permanently blocked the pro-abortion rule as a violation of religious freedom, the Washington Times reports. Previously, he temporarily blocked the rule, so it was not being enforced.

A group of states, including Texas, and the Christian health care provider Franciscan Alliance challenged the rule in court.

“HHS lacked the legal authority to re-write a number of federal laws that prevent sex discrimination and protect religious freedom, especially when it sought to do so by forcing doctors to perform — and American taxpayers to pay for — controversial medical procedures that are contrary to the religious and moral beliefs of millions across our nation,” Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said in a statement after the ruling.

Here’s more from the report:

“The Court granted HHS two years to complete its review and amend the Rule at issue,” Judge O’Connor said Tuesday in a 25-page opinion. “Despite HHS’s better efforts, the rule remains on the books.”

The Trump administration had asked the court for more time to rework the rule, but Judge O’Connor on Tuesday said time was up.

Susan B. Anthony List President Marjorie Dannenfelser said President Donald Trump did propose a new rule earlier this year to clarify that sex discrimination in Obamacare does not include abortion. She praised the Trump administration for protecting the rights of pro-life advocates and unborn babies.

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“This ruling is an important victory for the Trump administration and all pro-life Americans. Abortion is not health care and should never be mandated by the government,” Dannenfelser said. “President Trump and Secretary Azar have worked hard to put a stop to this manipulation of the law and to protect pro-life institutions and health care workers from being forced to participate in the destruction of innocent life.”

Back in 2017, the Trump administration issued another rule to protect the Little Sisters of the Poor and other religious employers from having to pay for drugs that may cause abortions in their employee health care plans under Obamacare. However, pro-abortion attorneys general in Pennsylvania, California and several other states filed lawsuits to overturn the religious protections. That court battle is on-going.

Trump’s Supreme Court Judges Both Voted to Uphold Pro-Life Law Saving Babies From Abortion

 https://www.lifenews.com/2020/06/29/trumps-supreme-court-judges-both-voted-to-uphold-pro-life-law-saving-babies-from-abortion/ 

Though pro-lifers mourned another loss at the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday in the fight to protect unborn babies and mothers, many found hope in the fact that both of President Donald Trump’s nominees rejected the majority opinion.

Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh dissented in June Medical Services v. Russo. The case involved a Louisiana law that requires abortionists to have hospital admitting privileges so that they can treat patients with potentially life-threatening complications.

On Monday, the four liberal justices and Chief Justice John Roberts decided that the law imposes an “undue burden” on women’s right to abortion. Roberts’ ruling was a huge disappointment for pro-life advocates. Many believed Roberts, a nominee of Republican President George W. Bush, would at least agree to uphold the modest abortion regulation for the sake of women’s health and safety, but he did not.

But pro-life leaders were happy with how Trump’s two choices ruled in the matter.

“We are pleased that the two Justices appointed by President Trump voted to protect women and to uphold the Louisiana pro-life law,” said James Bopp, general counsel for National Right to Life.

Gorsuch wrote a strong, critical dissent of the majority opinion, slamming the justices for ignoring “an array of rules” that keep the judiciary branch in check.

The rules make “sure that we are in the business of saying what the law is, not what we wish it to be,” Gorsuch wrote in his dissent. “Today’s decision doesn’t just overlook one of these rules. It overlooks one after another.”

At length, he listed Louisiana’s concerns for women’s health, including dozens of health and safety violations at abortion facilities, botched abortions, and new evidence suggesting abortion facilities may not have reported the rape of a young girl to authorities.

“At least one Louisiana abortion provider’s loss of admitting privileges following a patient’s death alerted the state licensing board to questions about his competence, and ultimately resulted in restrictions on his practice,” he wrote.

Gorsuch said Louisiana lawmakers had good reasons to pass the admitting privileges law. He said they heard testimony from women and emergency room physicians about abortion practitioners’ record of abandoning their patients.  One woman told lawmakers that the abortionist kicked her out while she was hemorrhaging, saying: “You’re on your own. Get out.” Later, at a hospital, an emergency room doctor found body parts from her aborted baby still inside her womb, according to the ruling. Another woman who complained of severe pain after her abortion said she was told to go home. But when she went to the emergency room, she said they found a tear in her uterus and “a large hematoma containing a fetal head.”

Gorsuch also pointed to new evidence of potential criminal conduct by Louisiana abortionists, including failing to report the rape of a minor and performing an abortion on a minor without parental consent.

He criticized the majority justices for “overlooking so many facts,” including the question of if abortion groups even have standing to sue on behalf of “an undefined, unnamed, indeed unknown, group of women who they hope will be their patients in the future.”

He hinted at the other justices’ hypocrisy, writing, “this Court has held that a pediatrician lacks standing to defend a State’s abortion laws on the theory that fetuses are his potential patients. If standing isn’t present in cases like those, it is hard to see how it might be present in this one.”

Gorsuch said the majority justices “brushed aside” the rules and “took shortcuts” to make their ruling.

“The real question we face concerns our willingness to follow the traditional constraints of the judicial process when a case touching on abortion enters the courtroom,” he wrote.

Kavanaugh also wrote a short dissent, arguing that the court should have remanded the case back to the lower court for a new trial and additional factfinding.

Pro-life leaders praised the four justices who dissented in the case, including Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, and emphasized the importance of re-electing Trump in November.

“The Supreme Court needs more justices willing to take a fresh look at Roe like those appointed by President Donald Trump,” said Joe Pojman of Texas Alliance for Life. “Our organization will continue to urge voters to re-elect President Trump.”

Susan B. Anthony List president Marjorie Dannenfelser also emphasized the vital importance of electing pro-life U.S. Senators to confirm good judicial nominees to the courts.

“Today’s ruling reinforces just how important Supreme Court judges are to advancing the pro-life cause. It is imperative that we re-elect President Trump and our pro-life majority in the U.S. Senate so we can further restore the judiciary, most especially the Supreme Court,” she said.

And if Joe Biden wins, Dannenfelser said it would be disastrous for the future of unborn babies.

“Joe Biden, who has abandoned babies in the womb he once voted to protect, vows to stack the Court with abortion extremists,” she said.

Several of the justices are getting older, including liberal Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and may retire within the next four years, meaning whoever wins in November may have the chance to appoint one or two new justices to the high court.

Pro-life groups ask FDA to pull “dangerous” abortion pill, declare it a public health hazard 

 https://pregnancyhelpnews.com/pro-life-groups-ask-fda-to-pull-dangerous-abortion-pill-declare-it-a-public-health-hazard 

Leaders from more than 20 pro-life, Christian and conservative organizations wrote to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) this week urging removal of the abortion pill from the U.S. market.

Citing the FDA’s own data and risk classification system for drugs, the groups called on the federal office to classify the abortion pill as an “imminent hazard to the public health” that poses a “significant threat of danger.”

“We urge you to protect American women and preborn children by removing the abortion pill (mifepristone) from the US market,” the pro-life coalition said. “This lethal drug that the FDA permits for killing innocent preborn children during the first 10 weeks of pregnancy is also highly dangerous for women.”

“The abortion pill is so dangerous the FDA placed it under a “risk evaluation mitigation strategy” (REMS),” the groups wrote.

The REMS “(requires) that the pill (Mifeprex/mifepristone) be prescribed and dispensed in a healthcare setting, hospital, or clinic.”   

Further under the REMS, women receive written disclosure of the abortion pill’s side effects, “which include hemorrhage, excruciating abdominal pain, and severe, potentially life-threatening infections,” and the prescribing clinician must also be capable of diagnosing ectopic pregnancy, a serious condition and leading cause of maternal death, the pro-life groups said. If an ectopic pregnancy goes undiagnosed, they noted, a woman could wrongly ascribe her severe pain and heavy bleeding to the usual abortion pill side-effects.

Chemical abortion pills are increasingly being dispensed outside FDA standards in various scenarios, including approved trials for abortion pills by mail, individuals or groups selling them illegally on the internet, and relaxed FDA guidelines during the coronavirus pandemic.

Gynuity Health Projects, a New York-based “reproductive health,” group got approval for its TelAbortion trial by the FDA in 2015 and is currently dispensing abortion pills by mail in 13 U.S. states.

In May dozens of pro-life and family organizations had written to the FDA, urging seizure of the website domains for two organizations accused of illegally prescribing and/or selling mifepristone in the U.S. The FDA had sent the two organizations letters in 2019 warning that if violations continued, they could be shut down and/or their web domains seized.

Earlier this month U.S. district judge Theodore Chuang suspended the FDA’s safety requirements mandating that women get the abortion drug in person from a doctor or other certified prescriber, ruling that they constitute a “substantial obstacle” to the “right” to an abortion during the coronavirus pandemic. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) had sued on behalf of the American College of Obstetricians & Gynecologists (ACOG) and other abortion-supporting groups in May demanding the suspension of the FDA’s requirement that mifepristone be dispensed in-person. The FDA has since appealed.

Calling use of the pandemic to challenge FDA safety protocols a “ruse,” the pro-life groups denounced Chuang’s ruling in the letter to the FDA this week, along with the idea that abortion drugs have constitutional status under Roe v. Wade. 

“The constitutional merits of the right to abortion aside, the Supreme Court places no burden on the FDA to approve dangerous methods of abortion,” they said. “Yet, on July 13, 2020, a lone federal district judge circumvented the FDA’s considered judgement that this dangerous drug be dispensed in a healthcare setting, and enjoined the FDA from fully enforcing the REMS protocols.” 

“This rogue judicial activism is a gross breach of the separation of powers, undermining the FDA’s statutory authority to regulate drug safety, while recklessly endangering American women and preborn children,” the pro-life groups added. “The FDA must fight back.”  

The pro-life groups told the FDA they were “encouraged by the FDA’s decision to shut down illegal websites trafficking unapproved abortion pills into the U.S.,” but warned that despite the risks, for years “the abortion industry has sought the total removal of all safety protocols and has even encouraged illegal means to circumvent REMS.”

Heartbeat Intentional, which manages the Abortion Pill Rescue Network (APRN), was a participant in the letter. 

The coalition of groups writing to the FDA was led by pro-life group Live Action.

“The abortion pill has resulted in over 4,000 reported adverse events since 2000, including 24 maternal deaths,” the pro-life groups stated, citing the FDA’s adverse event reporting system. 

They called attention to the likelihood that adverse event numbers are even higher, given that these events are “notoriously underreported to the FDA,” and also that since 2016, abortion pill manufacturers have only been required to report maternal deaths to the FDA...

Read more of the article by clicking on the link above

By Anne Marie Williams, RN, BSN | August 18, 2020

Students in Iowa State University professor Chloe Clark’s sophomore-level English 250 course were “warned” on their first day of class against publicly holding certain beliefs — including opposition to abortion. According to the class syllabus, obtained by Young America’s Foundation, students expressing any of the beliefs on Ms. Clark’s banned list in word or action would be “grounds for dismissal from the classroom.”

The syllabus read:

GIANT WARNING: any instances of othering that you participate in intentionally (racism, sexism, ableism, homophobia, sorophobia, transphobia, classism, mocking of mental health issues, body shaming, etc) in class are grounds for dismissal from the classroom. The same goes for any papers/projects: you cannot choose any topic that takes at its base that one side doesn’t deserve the same basic human rights as you do (ie: no arguments against gay marriage, abortion, Black Lives Matter, etc). I take this seriously.

Earlier in the syllabus, Ms. Clark states that her class will employ so-called “monster theory,” specifically studying how “throughout history, monsters have served as the ultimate example of the ‘other.'” In a November 2019 talk entitled “Our Monsters, Our Selves: How We Can Think about Privilege and Othering through Monstrosity,” she gave further context for her definition of “othering,” saying that it occurs “when people judge or discriminate against groups or individuals outside of their race or class.”

Ms. Clark’s choice of abortion as a specific example of “othering” — which she writes in the syllabus “has long been one of the most effective tactics to isolate and control groups of people” — is remarkably ironic.

Abortion actually is a clear case of “othering,” but probably not in the way Clark thinks. Abortion advocates have long used dehumanizing rhetoric to argue that preborn babies “don’t deserve the same basic human rights as you do.” With slogans like “my body, my choice,” abortion advocates have often promoted a false dichotomy that pits mothers against their own children in a zero sum game of “rights.” In addition, Clark is clearly discriminating against those who hold pro-life, conservative beliefs in her own class on “othering.”

The icing on the proverbial cake in Ms. Clark’s syllabus came in a note that read, “monster theory… may contain violent or disturbing imagery… If at any point you would like a Trigger Warning before viewings/readings that may contain this imagery, please let me know and I’m happy to provide them!” The mental gymnastics required to reconcile Clark’s rejection of discussing the violence of abortion against vulnerable human beings and simultaneous embrace of stories that “may contain violent or disturbing imagery” in order to make a point about “othering” are truly mind-boggling.

Iowa State University responded to Young America’s Foundation by saying that Clark’s syllabus was “inconsistent with the university’s standards and its commitment to the First Amendment rights of students,” adding:

After reviewing this issue with the faculty member, the syllabus has been corrected to ensure it is consistent with university policy.  Moreover, the faculty member is being provided additional information regarding the First Amendment policies of the university. 

Iowa State is firmly committed to protecting the First Amendment rights of its students, faculty, and staff. With respect to student expression in the classroom, including the completion of assignments, the university does not take disciplinary action against students based on the content or viewpoints expressed in their speech.