One of the clinics the Iowa affiliate of the Planned Parenthood abortion business runs in Iowa has stopped selling the dangerous RU 486 abortion drug that has killed dozens of women worldwide and injured thousands more in the United States alone.
Iowa Right to Life provided LifeNews with more details on how the sales have stopped and the clinic itself may close.
“Late last week, Iowa Right to Life learned that webcam abortions are no longer happening in Ankeny, Iowa. That Planned Parenthood of the Heartland clinic has not closed their doors yet, but they have drastically slashed their hours,’ the group said. “This location has been an on-going 40 Days for Life vigil site, as well as receiving year-round prayer support from countless individuals, many of which are a part of the DMACC Students for Life group.”
If the clinic eventually shuts down, it would follow the closing of clinics also doing telemed abortions — where women get the abortion drug after denied an in-person visit with a physician beforehand, as the FDA suggests.
In March, Planned Parenthood closed two centers that engage in telemed or webcam abortions. 40 Days for Life campaign director Shawn Carney announced the closures and joined local pro-life advocates at those centers in prayer during the national campaign.
“On March 1, Planned Parenthood’s failed telemed abortion facilities in Storm Lake and Knoxville, Iowa are closing forever, thanks in part to the hard work and prayers of hundreds of faithful Iowa pro-lifers who participated in 40 Days for Life campaigns outside each facility’s doors,” said David Bereit, national director of 40 Days for Life, at that time.
The webcam abortion practice started with the Planned Parenthood of the Heartland affiliate using it in Iowa, a rural state where the abortion business has a difficult time getting an abortion practitioner to each of its clinics. As a result, it set up a process by which the abortion practitioner only visits with the woman considering using the mifepristone abortion pill via a videoconference, as opposed to an in-person visit the FDA suggests.
With the drug having killed dozens of women worldwide and injured more than 2,200 alone in the United States, according to April 2011 FDA figures, pro-life groups have been concerned about Planned Parenthood putting women’s health at risk.
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RU 486 and its companion drug are administered between the fifth and ninth weeks of pregnancy, after pregnancy has been confirmed and the process typically involves three trips to a doctor. About half of the women abort while at the doctor’s office, with another 26 percent having an abortion within the next 20 hours at any location at home or in public. The remainder either have an abortion in the coming weeks or none at all of the drug fails to work — making it so a surgical abortion is required.
The FDA reports 2,207 adverse events related to the use of RU 486, including 14 deaths, 612 hospitalizations, 58 ectopic pregnancies, 339 blood transfusions, and 256 cases of infections in the United States alone. A European drug manufacturer has publicly stated that 28 women have died worldwide after using RU 486/mifepristone.
