Facebook profited from dangerous “Abortion Reversal” ads (reversal of abortion). The ads have been seen 18.4 million times from January 2020, according to a new report from the Center for Countering Digital Hate. This “reversal of abortion”, deemed unethical e unscientific, it is very worrying. Some accredited researchers haven’t even managed to submit patients to a study.
Abortion Reversal Ads on Facebook: Here’s What Happens
Most of the ads come from Live Action, a self-described “investigative journalism outlet”. Its goal is to “expose threats to the vulnerable and defenseless”. In numerous videos, the organization portrays the “reversal” of abortion after taking a dose of the abortion drug such as a proven and safe option.
What’s the gist of the video? A teenager or a woman in her twenties with a bright future, who may be attending university, takes a pregnancy test which appears to be positive. Under pressure from an abusive boyfriend, she is pushed into an office of the Planned Parenthood. Here an insistent and insensitive nurse or doctor subjects her to a drug abortion process. He takes the pills, crashes in the car and searches for information on Google. Then find the hotline for the reversal of abortion, who tells her that one procedure can reverse the effects of the first abortion pill.
The video finally ends on a healthy baby.
The Center for Countering Digital Hate found that, in about a year, Facebook allowed 92 such ads. Facebook’s ad library shows the company has earned in between 115,400 and 140,667 dollars for such announcements, from January 2020.
The procedure they propose, which uses theprogesterone hormone after the first dose of an abortive drug, it is not approved by the FDA. Furthermore there is no credible evidence that demonstrates its safety. In 2019, researchers from the University of California’s Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology had to stop the first credible study of the method. During the study two of the initial twelve participants suffered from potentially life-threatening bleeding.
Millions of dollars spent on ads
Nonetheless, the reversal of abortion has made its way into legislation. Eight states now mandate that abortion seekers must receiving incorrect information about a “reverse” option. Live Action ads also tend to target people in Texas. The country has passed an abortion law that allows citizens to be bounty hunters filing $ 10,000 lawsuits against people who try to have an abortion. Not only that: it is also possible to bring the lawsuit against the driver who accompanies people in the clinic.
Live Action founder Lila Rose called that law “a historic step for basic human rights.”
Facebook’s ad library shows that Live Action News and Live Action have spent over 1.7 million dollars in ads.
In 22 ads that garner over 500,000 impressions, Live Action claimed that 24 people have been killed since 2000 by the abortion drug mifepristone. However the FDA has added the disclaimer that these they should not necessarily be attributed to mifepristone. Indeed, improper administration of the drug to people with health complications could play an important role.
In an argument in support of the “reversal” of abortion, the organization also misleadingly linked to an unrelated study of progesterone used for pregnant people, not those who have already taken an abortion pill.
Although Facebook has revealed that ads “targeted at minors must not promote products, services or content that are inappropriate, illegal or unsafe, or that exploit, deceive or exert undue pressure on the age groups concerned”, it still allowed Live Action and others to address children from 13 to 17 years.
That description of prohibited content concerns, among the various ads, one in particular aimed at teenagers. The ad in question featured a “prolife OBGYN” who claimed to have “successfully reversed the effect of the abortion pill”. The video was seen further 110,000 times.
Facebook he hasn’t said anything yet regarding the announcements of reversal of abortion.