At the beginning of this year, thirteen thousand Dutch general practitioners received a remarkable post. A window envelope without a logo or sender contained a letter and a leaflet about the abortion pill, which has been available since January 1 not only in specialized clinics but also through general practitioners. “Why, as a general practitioner, I do not prescribe an abortion pill,” is stated on the front of the brochure, which was previously available, but like the letter, can no longer be found online. The text discusses, for example, additional workload and risks that the abortion drug may entail according to the sender. The brochure concludes with the words: “Lots of wisdom and strength, your doctor.”
However, the brochure was not drawn up by a general practitioner, but by a pro-life organization Choose Lifewhich aims, among other things, to prevent abortions. And that is why, several women’s rights organizations believe, the brochure and the letter are advertising expressions that, due to the appearance of neutrality, conflict with the rules of the Advertising Code Committee (RCC). RCC agreed with the complainants on Wednesday, those involved said NRC. Choose Life to stop distributing the leaflets. The complaint was submitted by, among others, Bureau Clara Wichmann, the Fiom Foundation and the Sexual Health Expert Group of the Dutch Society of General Practitioners. The result has not yet been made public because the parties still have fourteen days to appeal.
Liliane Ploumen, chairman of Bureau Clara Wichmannis satisfied with the ruling. “In the Netherlands and the rest of the world we see that misinformation is circulated disguised as facts. This statement shows that this is unacceptable. She calls the RCC’s advice a “strong slap on the fingers”.
Waiting room
The letter that accompanied the leaflet emphasizes the risks of the abortion pill and the additional responsibilities and additional work that the pill would impose on general practitioners. “It could be that a 37-year-old mother comes to you, brings a positive pregnancy test, tells you that she is six weeks pregnant and writes you a prescription based on this. While she is actually getting the abortion pill for her fifteen-year-old daughter that you know nothing about.” Kies Leven said it offered the leaflets so that general practitioners who agree with the contents can place the leaflets in the waiting rooms themselves.
The ‘abortion pill’ is a treatment that consists of two parts. The first pill is made from the drug mifepristone, which inhibits the action of the female hormone that maintains pregnancy. After about two days, the woman inserts four more misoprostol tablets vaginally. Since the beginning of this year, the pill has also been available through general practitioners who have been trained in this. About four hundred general practitioners had done this by the end of this summer (3 percent of the total). The motivation behind the availability of the abortion pill at the GP is that women who want an abortion can get it closer to home.
Various statements in the letter and the Kies Leven brochure appeal to feelings of fear without justification, the RCC concludes according to various parties involved. The letter states, for example, that because the abortion pill is available to the GP, the guidelines for the abortion pill have been “relaxed to such an extent to make prescribing possible that even abortion doctors point out the risks.” That suggestion stirs up fear and states that the guidelines have been relaxed when in fact this is not the case.
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‘As neutral as possible’
According to the committee, the letter also wrongly suggests that Dutch women are insufficiently prepared for the pain that abortion treatment with the pill can cause. The letter cites research from the United Kingdom and raises the question:Is that different in the Netherlands?”
According to Kies Leven, the brochure is “as neutral as possible”. The organization wanted to substantiate this neutrality during a session of the RCC in October by pointing out the various information providers mentioned in the brochure. The patient is referred to sites with pro-life ideas, but also to Fiom, for example. In the brochure, which has now been taken offline, Kies Leven calls agencies such as Fiom and Siriz “agencies financed by the government” and pro-life organizations such as BeschermdeWieg.nl and the AbortusSite.nl affiliated with Kies Leven as “independent organizations”. This is contrary to the Advertising Code because it “damages confidence in advertising”.
In the maze of data, women receive harmful information in this way
“Parties like us that provide neutral assistance are dismissed as non-objective,” Daphne Latour of Fiom said during the hearing. “And this does not happen on behalf of themselves, Kies Leven, but on behalf of ‘your doctor’. In that tangle of data, women receive harmful information in this way.”
When asked, Kees van Helden of Kies Leven said that the organization should have put its details on the envelope and the folder. He does not yet know whether the organization will object to the ruling. “We wanted the GP to put it in the waiting room and have him speak for him.”
The intention was that GPs would request more brochures from Kies Leven through the ‘trial brochure’ that they received. But that has not yet happened in large numbers. About fifteen general practitioners have requested additional brochures.
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