Last spring, a new abortion clinic opened in Montgomery County, Maryland. It’s called Carafem and it advertises a “spa-like” experience. Women entering the clinic are provided with cushy spa robes, tea, and a pill — to end the life of their unborn child. This abortion spa has a sort of salon atmosphere with wood floors and plush upholstery.
Eight videos obtained undercover by the Center for Medical Progress have educated us regarding Planned Parenthood’s secondary profits emanating from the sale of body parts derived from abortions. Carafem’s spa feels more cosmopolitan than the California and Texas clinics where these videos were obtained. But these spas that seek to de-stigmatize abortion still have to make a profit. Patients are expected to be in and out in an hour, leaving with a second pill. The actual abortion occurs at home with no medical professional present. Here, and in the videos, the mother’s well-being is compromised. The Center for Medical Progress videos reveal that surgical abortion procedures are altered to get specified baby parts and even intact fetuses. And these chemical abortions, launched in beautiful surroundings, are completed alone in bathrooms. In both situations, Big Abortion is placing profits ahead of womens’ health and safety.
Chemical abortion is riskier than surgical abortion, carrying four times the risk to women. Hemorrhage and incomplete abortion are more common.
The abortion spa is supposed to counter the stigma surrounding abortion, to “soften” it so it’s palatable to a country that’s becoming increasingly pro-life. Planned Parenthood spokesman, Eric Ferrero says, “Look, these are really complicated and personal issues.”
When a woman faces an unwanted pregnancy, abortion can appear to be the best answer, not just an easier way out. But the pro-abortion side is masking the reality that abortion takes a child’s life, instead portraying it as a “courageous” decision. Feminist poet Katha Pollit argues in her new book entitled PRO: RECLAIMING ABORTION RIGHTS, “We need to talk about ending a pregnancy as a common, even normal event in the reproductive rights of women” adding that a woman’s decision to abort can be “just as moral as the decision to have a child — indeed sometimes more moral.”
“Part of caring for children,” she writes, “is knowing when it’s not a good idea to bring them into the world.”
Pro life leaders don’t think the abortion spas will make abortion less disgusting or revolting to women choosing it. Marjorie Dannenfelser of Susan B. Anthony’s List says women getting abortions see it as “a necessary evil.” Carol Tobias, President of National Right to Life says “trying to put pretty wrappings around the procedure isn’t going to make any difference.”
Carafem President Christopher Purdy would like to expand his model for abortion spas to other states. “It’s fresh, it’s modern, it’s clean, it’s caring,” he said in March. “That’s the brand we’re trying to create.” Five months later some videos are badly tarnishing this brand.