By Sarah Holliday

According to Planned Parenthood’s video explaining how to use the abortion pill, “Abortion is very common. It’s also very safe. And serious problems are extremely rare.” However, a recent study conducted by researchers at the pro-life Charlotte Lozier Institute revealed that complications may not be so rare after all.

The research is “based on 2004-15 data in the 17 states where Medicaid covers abortion expenses,” The Washington Times reported, and it takes into account “women who had recently given birth; undergone surgical abortions or visited the emergency room for any reason.” The study found that “women who visit emergency rooms after taking abortion pills are more likely to be seen for serious medical problems than their cohorts whose pregnancies end with surgical abortions or live births.”

In addition, the study found that 75% of the women who went into the emergency room (ER) — or the emergency department (ED) — after taking the abortion pill were rated as “severe or critical.”

Critics of the research claim that it does not represent the reality of why these women go into the ER. Dr. Michael Belmonte, a fellow at the American Academy of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, argued that “adverse events” concerning abortion pill usage are “extremely rare.” In his opinion, women go to the ER for “reassurance rather than a true safety concern.” But as the statistics convey, “Using the five-level Ambulatory Payment Classification System … ER visits coded at the most serious ‘severe or critical’ levels increased as follows: no pregnancy, 101.0%; surgical abortion, 450.6%; abortion pill, 4041.1%, and live birth, 20.9%.”

Additionally, “by 2015, 75.7% of visits following abortion-pill usage were rated in the ‘severe or critical’ categories versus 66.1% for surgical abortions; 56.6% for live births, and 54% for no pregnancy.” The researchers at Lozier concluded, “Consistent with national trends for ED visits, both the number and acuity of ED visits following pregnancy outcomes are increasing. ED visit acuity following chemical abortion is persistently and significantly higher than for surgical abortion or live birth.”

This data “really blows the argument out of the water that was levied against us, that these are just women who want reassurance,” said Dr. Ingrid Skop, Charlotte Lozier’s vice president of medical affairs. “[M]any of these women are having complex medical events, and that’s what this study shows.” Adding to this, Mary Szoch, director of Family Research Council’s Center for Human Dignity, shared with The Washington Stand, “The abortion industry has done a great job of convincing Americans that the abortion drug, mifepristone, is a magic wand that rewinds time to a point before an unborn baby was ever brought into existence.” This, however, “is obviously a lie.”

According to Szoch, for anyone “to believe something that is so obviously untrue” points to “a kind of incredible desperation,” which happens to be what “the abortion industry preys upon” most. Particularly for women, “in that moment of desperation, the industry tells [them] to move as rapidly as possible, to ignore any indications of danger to their own life, and [to] completely ignore the fact that their unborn child will be killed.” The goal of abortionists is to convince a pregnant woman “to just act,” Szoch observed, rather than to consider the action.

“No one should take serious action when they are feeling desperate,” she added, “but many do.” And the consequences of “when women ingest mifepristone” are that “the drug ends their unborn child’s life and puts their own in danger,” which Szoch described as “horrific.”

“The place where a child should be the safest becomes the place where the child is brutally starved to death,” she concluded. “Hopefully the physical dangers of this drug to women will encourage moms who are unexpectedly pregnant to pause and take a moment to think about what God could do with a future that includes their child living her life alongside them.”

Sarah Holliday is a reporter at The Washington Stand.