Controversial Website Offers Advice to Women on How to Perform Abortions at Home — Despite Risks Involved
A controversial new website has been created by an international advocacy group that offers women online advice on how to use abortion-inducing drugs at home.
The website was launched by a group in the Netherlands called "Women Help Women," which offers "self-managed abortion: safe and supported (SASS)."
It provides services for women seeking to end their pregnancies using the abortion pills mifepristone (Mifeprex) and misoprostol, which require a prescription in the U.S. but can be purchased on the Internet or from other countries.
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The project was set up in response to increasingly restrictive laws on abortion in many states and the Trump administration anti-abortion stance, CBS News reported.
"Women Help Women" claims their website does not actually sell abortion pills to women in the U.S., but only offers "guidance" to those who want to abort the babies inside them.
However, the site includes a link that abortion seekers can click if they want to get the pills.
Users who log on are connected with an abortion counselor for step-by-step, real-time advice on how to use the abortion pill, according to CBN News.
Pro-life advocates said the launch of the controversial website shows the abortion industry's determination to promote their cause—even with the knowledge that using the abortion pill without a prescription is unsafe.
Former Planned Parenthood director turned pro-lifer Abby Johnson said the business of guiding women to self-abort is "dangerous."
Krisi Hamrick, spokesman for Americans United for Life, agrees.
"These drugs are deadly. If they are mishandled, they result in serious injury," Hamrick said in an interview with The Washington Post.
"To just distribute them and put them in an automatic dispenser like a can of soda is absolutely medical malpractice," she added.
According to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the pills can lead to very heavy vaginal bleeding that will need to be stopped by a surgical procedure, often performed in a doctor's office.
The agency says it has received reports of serious adverse effects in women who took Mifeprex, including one case of ectopic pregnancy resulting in death, and several cases of sepsis, including some that were fatal.
