According to NARAL Pro-Choice America’s Virginia branch, pregnancy centers are “fake” abortion clinics. Their website helps “educate” readers on the "evils” of such clinics, such as their affiliation with national organizations like Care Net, while explaining how Care Net pours eighty-six percent—nearly 5 million dollars—of their annual revenue into supporting local centers.

This page—and other pages and articles like it, are written to help raise funds for abortion activism for organizations like NARAL and Planned Parenthood. But, sadly, this characterization of a pregnancy center as a “fake” clinic deceives many in our culture.

Let’s start with the facts. Pregnancy centers have been operating in communities since the 1970s to help women and men facing an unexpected or unplanned pregnancy. They are community-based nonprofit organizations that provide support, coaching, free pregnancy tests, information about pregnancy options, and more before a pregnancy decision is made. Some centers offer medical services such as consultations with licensed medical professionals, ultrasounds, or testing for STDs and infections.

After a decision has been made, men and women can come back to the center for support ranging from parenting education to abortion recovery. They can participate in parenting skill development classes and even receive support for their relationship or marriage.

Care Net’s pregnancy centers – over 1,100 affiliates -- are places where women and men feel supported, understood, and safe. Unlike abortion clinics that push only one option for dealing with an unplanned pregnancy, Care Net’s centers present women with all of their options so they can be fully informed about a decision that will impact their entire life.

Pregnancy centers desire an honest and open relationship with their clients. Women can take home a 36-page publication called, Before You Decide Magazine. This resources empowers women with data—including 192 separate research-based references—on the potential negative consequences of abortion so they can review the science for themselves.  

By definition, “fake” means counterfeit, sham, hoax, or forgery. To call a pregnancy center a “fake” clinic couldn’t be further from the truth because pregnancy centers don’t try to replicate or aspire to be anything like abortion clinics where women are often told lies that disregard science. At abortion clinics women are told the fetus isn’t actually a baby yet. They’re told it won’t feel anything. Or, they’re told there are no “side effects” from abortion.

Women have died at abortion clinics and botched abortions have led to unspeakable things happening to babies who survived. Pregnancy centers have no desire to replicate that. We’ve never had a woman or her baby die at one of our centers.

There’s not a Care Net center in the country that aspires to replicate what happens in an abortion clinic. Pregnancy centers aren’t “fake” abortion clinics. Instead, they’re beacons of light and hope in their community that offer a safe shelter for women and men who want to explore all of their options.