Take action and urge your state legislators to reject legislation that would give these fake clinics that judge, shame, and mislead Florida women permanent tax dollars.
Crisis Pregnancy Centers are Fake Clinics.
Florida’s HB 41/SB 444 would give them permanent tax dollars.
Fake Clinics masquerade as real women’s health clinics.
Crisis Pregnancy Centers (CPCs) are anti-abortion, often religiously affiliated organizations posing as women’s health clinics that fail to provide comprehensive, evidence-based medical care. CPCs use deceptive and manipulative practices to ultimately shame women out of getting reproductive care – particularly birth control and abortion. These fake clinics use deceptive advertising practices such as intentionally placing advertisements under the “abortion services” heading of phone and Internet directories and choosing names that are similar to abortion clinics to confuse women about what types of services they provide. People who are pregnant and seeking health care deserve timely access and a full range of care options, not medically inaccurate information pushed upon them by fake clinics.
Fake Clinics judge, shame, and mislead women.
Florida women often describe being harassed, bullied, and given blatantly false information at CPCs. Here are three of their stories:
Janessa
Tampa Bay
Janessa from the Tampa Bay Area went to a local clinic that advertised free ultrasound services. Unfortunately, the clinic was a CPC, and instead of providing Janessa with a reliable ultrasound, they shamed her for her decision to have an abortion. Staff repeatedly forced her to view the ultrasound images of her “baby boys,” and told her they would call her after she left to discuss her pregnancy, despite her distress.
Christine
Jacksonville
Christine, a single mother in Jacksonville, found out she was pregnant after she got a free pregnancy test from a local clinic. After thoughtful consideration, she decided that an abortion was the right choice for her, and went back to the clinic — a CPC — for a free ultrasound. CPC staff falsely told Christine that she would have to wait for another two weeks before she could have an ultrasound; then, they talked to her about religion, forced her to hold a doll that they claimed was “what a baby would look like at six weeks,” and lied to her about her fetus’ development, saying that her baby already had a brain and would feel pain during an abortion procedure.
Katherine
Florida Panhandle
Katherine, from the Florida panhandle drove hours to her nearest abortion provider, only to be lured into a CPC next door to the clinic, with a similar name and staff who assured her she was in the right place. Fortunately, before Katherine supplied any of her personal information or details about her medical history, she asked if they provided abortion care, and when they admitted that they did not — and had misled her about where she was — Katherine left the CPC.
Fake Clinics would get permanent taxpayer funding under HB 41/SB 444.
By making permanent the sending of tax dollars to CPCs, anti-abortion lawmakers in Florida are demonstrating a total disregard for the truth, undermining a woman’s right to make her own informed medical decisions and denying women the respect and dignity they deserve.