Essential services? Operating status of crisis pregnancy centres in the United States during the COVID-19 pandemic

In March 2020, as COVID-19 rapidly spread across the United States, a singular question emerged: What are essential services? While anti-choice lawmakers attempted to classify abortion as non-essential despite professional medical associations affirming abortion to be essential, time-sensitive healthcare, little attention was paid to crisis pregnancy centres (CPCs). CPCs purport to assist ‘vulnerable’ pregnant people, but many use medical misinformation and misleading tactics to discourage pregnant people from abortion.1 Many CPCs attempt to present as medical offices, but most are staffed by unlicensed volunteers who provide over-the-counter pregnancy tests and non-diagnostic (‘keepsake’) ultrasounds.1 Their number is rapidly increasing and fuelled by public funding; CPCs now vastly outnumber abortion clinics nationwide.1 The Alliance: State Advocates for Women’s Rights & Gender Equality is a collaboration of four state-based law and policy centres working for gender equality (Gender Justice, Legal Voice, Southwest Women’s Law Center and Women’s Law Project). With CPC project partner California Women’s Law Center, The Alliance maintains a database of CPCs in nine states (Alaska, California, Idaho, Minnesota, Montana, New Mexico, Oregon, Pennsylvania and Washington) using online …