A tearful woman contacts a US hotline after becoming overcome with guilt after taking an abortion medication. Despite doctors’ caution that it could be fatal, it suggests a “reversal” procedure to preserve the foetus. Since the Supreme Court overturned the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that secured a constitutional right to abortion, misinformation about medical termination seems to have risen sharply.
This includes deceptive “pro-life” social media messages asserting that abortion medicines cause cancer and infertility, as well as “pro-choice” material endorsing questionable herbal remedies to end a pregnancy. The promotion of an unproven medication that claims to reverse the effects of the first tablet, mifepristone, in the two-drug regimen for medical abortion, is more striking, according to researchers.
Abortion pill reversal says ‘here is a second chance at life, just in time’
American opponents of abortion have praised the so-called “reversal” procedure, which involves taking progesterone, for women who decide against having an abortion after taking mifepristone. The Abortion Pill Rescue Network (APRN), a pro-life organization that advocates the procedure, states on its website that “abortion pill reversal can help turn back the clock.”
“Abortion pill reversal says ‘here is a second chance at life, just in time,’ when destructive voices would only say ‘it is done. The website of APRN features emotional “success stories” from women who choose the procedure. After taking the first tablet, some people started crying, among them Shashana, a single mother.
When she contacted the APRN hotline, she began the “reversal” operation, which, according to her written account, saved her foetus. It is not noted that the procedure is “unproven,” “unethical,” and “not based on science,” according to the American College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (ACOG), a group of reproductive health experts.
A 2019 medical trial conducted by the University of California, Davis researchers to evaluate the efficacy of the “reversal” treatment was also skipped. After several trial participants had significant internal bleeding, the experiment had to be abruptly ended.
“The anecdotal ‘success stories’ often fail to acknowledge that there is no reputable medical evidence that taking progesterone to reverse the effects of mifepristone increases the likelihood of a pregnancy continuing,” Anicka Slachta, a senior analyst at the watchdog NewsGuard, told AFP. “Ultimately, omitting that context and presenting abortion pill ‘reversal’ as definitively safe and effective has the potential to cause harm.”
“What was clear in the call is that this group cares more about the life of the baby than the mother, point blank,” the researcher told AFP, requesting anonymity for fear of online harassment.
When AFP asked APRN to submit supporting information and interviews with the ladies named under the “success stories,” a spokesperson for Heartbeat International, an anti-abortion organization that supports the network, responded.
She asked what the AFP piece was meant to draw attention to and then she stopped talking. The network had successfully saved 4,000 newborns through the “reversal” procedure, according to information provided to a US health disinformation researcher who called APRN’s hotline while pretending to be pregnant.
The hotline operator indicated a success rate of 64–68%
The hotline operator indicated a success rate of 64–68%, a figure also seen on the network’s website, without disclosing the percentage of unsuccessful instances. The operator described ACOG as “very dubious” when the researcher—who shared the audio tape with AFP—mentioned that the group did not deem the procedure safe.
“That was evident in the way they referred to the fetus but also through the omission of any real data about the risks.” In a report last week, the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) said thousands of “fake clinics” across the United States — which seek to prevent “abortion-determined” people from accessing care — collectively spent $10.2 million on Google search ads over the past two years.
The “potentially dangerous” reversal operation was encouraged by many of them, it claimed. Online discussions regarding pill “reversals” were one of three themes related to abortion misinformation that had a substantial increase in the months following Roe v. Wade’s decision, according to research by the technology organization Meedan Digital Health Lab.
The concept of someone changing their mind about getting an abortion on their own is not harmful, according to Jenna Sherman, a program manager at the nonprofit, who spoke to AFP.