As a feminist, I'm often asked if I think something like Roe v. Wade and the Christian right controlling abortions could happen in the UK. The problem is it's already happening.
Last night in Crisis Pregnancy Centres Uncovered, BBC Panorama highlighted some of the horrific practices that happen when people seek help for unwanted pregnancies in the UK.
Pregnancy counselling is available on the NHS and via regulated abortion providers. However, waiting lists and lack of funding have prompted some people to access charity-ran centres, many of which are funded by Christian organisations.
Panorama identified 57 of these and decided to investigate after hearing about women experiencing trauma. While the centres are supposed to be there for pregnant people who need help, most say they don’t refer people for abortions, instead counselling and support. However, in over a third, this “support” often involves false and ethical medical information and manipulative advice.
Of the 57 centres contacted, 34 of them did signpost the NHS website or regulated abortion providers – but 21 were found by the programme to be manipulative and anti-abortion.
Panorama found that seven of the centres said having an abortion could lead to a mental health condition that is said to be similar to PTSD, “post-abortion syndrome.” The NHS does not recognise the “condition.” Eight reportedly said termination could cause infertility and problems carrying pregnancies to term in the future; again, no medical evidence supports this. Finally, five incorrectly told people that abortion is a cause of breast cancer.
An unwanted pregnancy can cause huge amounts of stress. When tensions and emotions are high, it’s a lot easier to be manipulated, which is exactly the opportunity some members of the Christian right seems to be taking.
During telephone and in-person consultations, undercover investigators were subjected to horrific sentiments and highly manipulative speeches, including that they would “suffer the consequences” of their decision and told that the women who have abortions “suffer emotional disturbances" because “they know they have been a mother, but they have no baby.” They were also asked, “how would it feel to hold your own baby” and told that it would be “amazing” to have a child.
Most disturbingly, one centre actually said that women who have abortions could regret it so much that they hallucinate hearing babies crying and having nightmares of something happening to a child.
But it’s even worse for pregnant people who go into the centre.
In the show, an undercover reporter visited Crossroads Crisis Pregnancy Centre, which is based inside a Baptist church in Harrow. The reporter told a counsellor she was three weeks pregnant, and when she enquired about abortion was told, "The baby is waiting for the pill to kill it and to get rid of it." She was also told abortions weren’t safe and that “some will bleed to death, and all sorts of things happen."
Incredibly, the counsellor later said she was not telling the woman not to have an abortion.
Crossroads Crisis Pregnancy Centre and the counsellor did not respond to Panorama’s request for comment.
In my neck of the woods, Tyneside Pregnancy Advice Centre in Newcastle lists its "Christian ethos" on its website and is ran by anti-abortion NHS paediatrician Dr Chris Richards. An undercover reporter told an adviser she married with two children, to which they asked her to consider, "Would you be able to tell your daughters about having a termination? Or would it be something you'd always have to keep quiet about?"
This is manipulative beyond words; perhaps even worse, she was given a leaflet which suggested having an abortion meant you weren’t fit to be “around children,” as the advisor reportedly told her. The advisor added that if she still wanted an abortion, she could go to the NHS.
Tyneside Pregnancy Advice Centre director Dr Chris Richards said, “We have a 14-year track record of compliance with all our regulatory obligations, and over 1,200 women have benefited from the work of our staff and volunteers.”
He added that anyone who has read the centre’s website can see “where they are coming from.”
The advisor did not respond to Panorama’s request for comment.
Perhaps the most shocking was the case of the centre in Belfast run by the influential American anti-abortion group Stanton International, which says it’s “a safe place where women are empowered to make their best choice." This was anything but the case for Ashleigh, who contacted Panorama after using the service in 2021.
Despite being told she could get an abortion at the centre, Ashleigh claimed this wasn’t true and she says she was told she’d need an ultrasound, during which she was forced to look at the image of her unborn twins. She left the centre and got an abortion elsewhere but said the experience left her traumatised.
The use of ultrasounds is a common tactic in anti-abortion centres, to manipulate pregnant people into keeping their babies after seeing them, as it makes it more real, thus piling on the guilt.
Danielle Versluys, Stanton International’s Chief Operating Officer, told Panorama she was not prepared to discuss ‘post-abortive syndrome’ but added, “Within our clinics, women are advised that having an abortion could lead to lifelong grief, sorrow, regret and it can impact them negatively.”
Asked about their leaflets, Mrs Versluys said, “I don’t believe it’s inappropriate to show a woman what the actual outcome of an abortion is.”
Defending Stanton’s use of ultrasound scans, she said, “The truth should not be hidden from women…And so to provide a medical scan… is absolutely acceptable and called for and necessary for a woman to make an informed choice.”
“We are committed to providing women with the truth and with the resources that they need to make the best possible decisions for them and their baby,” Mrs Versluys said.
As Stanton Healthcare will only see women who test positive on-site, Claire, who was 10 weeks into a planned pregnancy, agreed to secretly film for the show. She was told that she would suffer from post-abortion syndrome, which "erodes your mental health" for six months to six years, Panorama reports. She was also told, “within 48 hours, your baby will die of hunger and thirst. It will be starved to death.” She was given leaflets that contained graphic images of supposed aborted fetuses and were informed that the centre provided financial “help” (read incentives) to anyone who kept their babies.
It’s easy to think that the anti-abortion rhetoric spread by the Christian right is something confined to the US, but Panorama proved that it's also dangerously spreading in the UK.
Last year Heidi Crowther, a woman with Downs syndrome, lost her high court case against allowing terminations up to birth if the foetus has a condition such as hers. The logical solution here in my mind, as I wrote for GLAMOUR at the time, was to allow abortions up to term no matter the condition of the fetus and for the government to provide more support for parents of disabled children.
Heidi is a proud Christian, which meant she was represented by Jason Coppell, from The Christian Institute, and the case became about restricting abortion.
As someone who had an abortion in the worst period of my life, I know that visiting these centres would’ve caused me a huge amount of trauma and possibly even stopped me from getting a termination.
Though this isn’t the case for everyone and all reasons for abortion are valid, some seek abortions at desperate times of their lives, to escape abusive relationships or when keeping a baby will cause them harm. A study in JAMA Psychiatry found that suicide rates are 6% higher in women of childbearing age in states that restrict abortion. These centres manipulate untold numbers of pregnant people a year; how many suicides could they be causing?
Pregnant people seek out these centres as they think they will receive judgement-free care, but instead, their condition is used against them. If this is allowed to persist, it doesn’t seem unlikely that something similar to Roe v Wade will happen here in my lifetime.
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