State abortion laws are so confusing. Planned Parenthood hopes a new digital tool can help.
Alabama got the attention of the nation in May when its governor signed a full-on abortion ban into law. However, despite the headlines, did you know that it's still legal (and possible) to get an abortion in Alabama? In the current confusing, patchwork landscape of abortion restriction laws, you'd be forgiven for being misinformed.
On Tuesday, Planned Parenthood launched a new digital tool called the Abortion Care Finder. During a time of regulatory muddle, PP hopes the tool will make accessing abortion services more transparent and straightforward for women in need.
When a user inputs their age, location, and length of their pregnancy, the digital portal will allow them to locate the nearest Planned Parenthood clinic, and tell them whether in-clinic procedures or abortions via medication are available. There are buttons to "Book an Appointment" or "View Details," both of which take users to the clinic's website.
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The tool will also provide users with a guide to how the specific abortion laws in their state apply to them, which can be difficult to parse. That's because in the first half of 2019 alone, states enacted 58 restrictive laws governing abortions. The tool breaks down what these laws mean for people, including information about waiting periods (the requirement to wait 24 - 72 hours between an initial in-person consultation and the procedure), gestational periods (how far along a pregnancy is), and parental consent. The Care Finder will update its information when states pass new laws.
"We created the tool because we know that there was a need coming from people actually concerned about abortion becoming more and more restricted," Kevin Williams, Planned Parenthood Federation of America's (PPFA) national director of digital products, told Mashable. "I think what's different is it's very specific."
To test out the tool, and having read about the Alabama law back in May, I typed an Alabama zip code into the Care Finder, and entered information as if I was a 16-year-old who hadn't had a period in two months. Assuming the portal would tell me I'd have to travel far for services, I was surprised to learn that there was still abortion access available in Birmingham, Alabama. I'd need parental consent, and the Planned Parenthood clinic would have to do the procedure in-person — no medical pill available. But a Planned Parenthood still stood: It turns out that, in October, a judge temporarily blocked the law from going into effect. I'd missed the news, but the tool hadn't.
"The abortion restrictions that are in place at the state level are so nuanced and so buried in the potpourri of news that we're experiencing these days that having having an easy, searchable, navigable way to find that information when one might need it is absolutely a necessary, helpful, and important tool," Ginny Ehrlich, the CEO of reproductive health non-profit Power to Decide, who is not involved with the tool, told Mashable.
The tool does have its limits. It does not include payment information in the portal itself. Paying for health services is a roadblock women face in receiving abortion care (which is why Abortion Funds are a key part of improving access). However, each clinic has payment and insurance information on its website, and the tool prominently links out to these sites with a large "View Details" button.
Additionally, it only refers users to Planned Parenthood clinics, which means it doesn't necessarily reflect the full picture of available care. However, if there are no PP clinics within 60 miles of a person's location, it will inform the user to call a clinic, and get more detailed information about their options, as informed by the National Abortion Federation.
"We know our health centers have a lot more information around options and the ability to connect a person with additional resources, so we start there," Williams said.
Having this tool exist on Planned Parenthood itself, and sharing information about Planned Parenthood health care, makes sense. Williams said they created the tool after noticing that people were searching for "abortion near me" on the PP website.
"We saw an uptick in activity on our website, with folks actually trying to get more information on how to get an abortion, what their abortion options are, whether abortion is legal in their state, and just any restrictions that would potentially prevent them from having access," Williams said.
Ehrlich also pointed out that having this tool exist within PP would actually make it useful to people in need.
"While the same kind of database might exist in another organization, Planned Parenthood is a really great place for it to be, because that that's a natural place for people to go," Ehrlich said.
Of course, providing information is only one half of the battle to protect abortion rights.
"This tool along with a lot of other tools that are out there are really important because women today can't wait for policy solutions or regulatory solutions to be put in place or undone," Ehrlich said. "They have real time decisions to make and they have real time actions to take. For that reason this tool helps them do that while we try to fight the longer game around really ensuring that our policy and government, both at the state and federal level, support women's access to the full spectrum of reproductive health services."
You can check out the Abortion Care Finder at PlannedParenthood.org/AbortionCareFinder.
