Planned Parenthood Centers Using Dangerous Abortion Drug More, Survey Shows
by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
March 16, 2010
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) — A national survey of Planned Parenthood abortion centers finds a higher number are giving women the dangerous RU 486 abortion drug that has killed at least 13 women worldwide and injured more than 1,100 in the U.S. alone. The increase comes as one woman received attention for live blogging her abortion.
Yesterday, the American Life League released its annual survey of Planned Parenthood locations.
The pro-life group tells LifeNews.com that the number of locations dispensing the dangeorus abortion drug has risen 130 percent since its last national survey, even though the overall number of Planned Parenthood centers is on the decline.
Rita Diller, national director of ALL’s Stop Planned Parenthood project, commented on the results.
“While we are thrilled to see the number of Planned Parenthood affiliates and facilities declining, we are extremely dismayed to see Planned Parenthood continuing to build its abortion business by increasing the number of facilities administering deadly abortion pills,” she told LifeNews.com.
The drug has killed eight women alone in the United States because Planned Parenthood previously told women using it to use the drug vaginally instead of orally. That causes the introduction of bacteria that resulted in lethal infections causing their deaths.
Although Planned Parenthood eventually changed its protocol to follow the FDA suggestion to take the drug orally, it still dispenses improper doses of the drug that could still place women at risk.
Diller explained that the abortion drug makes it easier for Planned Parenthood to increase its business at a lower cost.
“The abortion pill regimen, appearing under names such as mifepristone (RU-486) and methotrexate, is being pushed by Planned Parenthood in order to increase its abortion business,” Diller said.
“Since Planned Parenthood charges about the same amount for medical abortion as surgical abortion, it stands to dramatically increase its profits from abortion by hawking the pills. With an abortion pill, there is no need for a surgeon, surgical staff, a surgical suite and all the expenses those services entail," she said.
Looking at the numbers from the report, in November 2009 Planned Parenthood had 96 affiliates, down three from the previous year. The 2009 number reflects a 47-percent decline from 1987, when it boasted 181 affiliates.
As of Nov. 30, 2009, Planned Parenthood was operating 817 facilities in the U.S., 27 fewer than at the end of 2008 and down 13 percent from the all-time high of 938 facilities in 1995.
The new report also shows Planned Parenthood operating one less surgical abortion facility than it did in 2008. There were 16 fewer non-express facilities and 11 fewer express facilities that distribute birth control and make abortion referrals but do not do abortions.
The decline is music to Diller’s ears.
“Planned Parenthood’s flight from numerous communities and neighborhoods means that parents and grandparents can rest more peacefully in the knowledge that Planned Parenthood is no longer lurking around the next corner, waiting for the opportunity to kill innocent preborn babies, and sexualize and steal the souls of children and teens who most need our protection,” Diller said.
“The closing of these facilities is a testament to the fact that when local people actively oppose Planned Parenthood, community support erodes, and when community support erodes, Planned Parenthood facilities shut down," she added.
Diller said she is disappointed that Planned Parenthood continues promioting the abortion drug despite the experience of Angie Jackson.
Even though the abortion pill experience is painful, protracted and often traumatic for the women who use it, as evidenced by Jackson, who shared her negative abortion experience on Twitter and YouTube, Planned Parenthood continues to sell the pills to unsuspecting women.
They take the first pill in the office, and then are sent home with the second pill and left on their own to deal with profuse bleeding and persistent pain, Diller lamented.
According to FDA reports as of December 2006, there have now been eight known deaths associated with mifepristone in the U.S., nine life-threatening incidents, 116 blood transfusions, and 232 hospitalizations. In total, more than 1,100 women have had medical problems after using the drug as of that date.
In January 2008, Danco Laboratories announced approximately 13 percent of all abortions in the United States involve mifepristone — a number that may seem low but it is double the number of women who used the abortion drug in 2001.
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