Women’s Health Center of West Virginia launches campaign promoting abortion pills

A Charleston women’s clinic has launched an ad campaign letting West Virginia residents know that despite the state’s near total ban on abortion, they still have options.

The Women’s Health Center of West Virginia has teamed up with Shout Your Abortion to promote the abortion pill with a new PSA campaign, billboards, mailers and digital advertising targeting the core demographic for abortions. 

“There’s still, to this day, so much misinformation circulating about reproductive healthcare, and our responsibility for being a trusted partner for 50 years in West Virginia as a healthcare provider is to make sure patients can access accurate information and compassionate care,” said Danielle Maness, a provider and clinician at the Women’s Health Center of West Virginia. 

Maness added that the health center doesn’t promote any certain healthcare for patients, but makes sure they have accurate information to make decisions themselves.

The PSA depicts a woman facing an unwanted pregnancy that’s not an emergency because she has abortion pills on hand, said Amelia Bonow, director of Shout Your Abortion. The ads refer people to the website https://www.youalwayshaveoptions.com/, which lists reproductive health resources, including where people can access abortion pills. 

“We want to elevate that in order to sort of kind of move people into this future of abortion access that we’re currently in, where laws and, like, legality and access are no longer interchangeable,” Bonow said. “And we also want to make sure that folks in places like West Virginia know that they have incredible community healthcare in their states that are ready to meet them where they are and offer compassionate, non-judgmental …options (like) counseling. So not promoting any path with any person, but helping them based on their needs and circumstances and desires to understand what their options are.”

The campaign launched Sept. 7 and will run through October. 

The West Side clinic stopped providing abortion in September 2022, after state lawmakers passed a ban on the procedure with narrow exceptions. A law prohibiting abortion in West Virginia state code became effective after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade and the federal right to an abortion.

Shout Your Abortion is a public education campaign that started in 2015 when Bonow’s personal story went viral, leading to tens of thousands of women sharing their own reproductive health stories. 

“(Shout Your Abortion) was initially really just about normalizing abortion, creating places to talk about our experiences and art and media and events all over the country,” Bonow said. “And then as the legal landscape has changed, and as we’re now in the midst of our second Trump administration, SYA has shifted to be really about helping people understand their options for abortion access, and also sort of how to activate people to be resources for that information in their community.”

While abortion, including by telehealth, is mostly illegal in the state, it’s still happening. Last year 780 medication abortions took place in West Virginia, according to data from Guttmacher Institute, a research and policy organization that aims to advance “sexual and reproductive health and rights worldwide.” 

West Virginia’s Republican lawmakers in recent years also have pushed bills that would target out-of-state health providers and organizations that mail abortion drugs into the state, though prosecuting out-of state-agencies may be difficult. 

Twenty-two states and the District of Columbia have enacted shield laws that protect against out-of-state investigation and prosecutions, according to KFF, a nonprofit health policy research, polling, and news organization.

Since 2023, 1,680 medication abortions have taken place in West Virginia — all through clinicians in states with shield laws, according to Guttmacher. 

“We see time and time again that West Virginia legislators and politicians are repeatedly putting policies in place that are directly in opposition for what our population, our communities and what Appalachians actually need,” Maness said of bills that would target out-of-state abortion pill providers. “…They’re trying to put policies in place that are directly in opposition to what Appalachians are actually wanting.”

The Women’s Health Clinic and Shout Your Abortion aren’t the first organizations to promote the abortion pill in West Virginia. Last year, Mayday Health ran a campaign promoting the medication at gas stations in Kentucky and West Virginia. Last week Kentucky sued the organization over the advertisements, alleging they broke state law. 

This year marks the 50th anniversary for the Women’s Health Center, which was West Virginia’s first provider of elective abortion. 

After the abortion ban took effect, the clinic pivoted to add new services, Maness said. Now, the health center offers gynecological and annual wellness exams, gender-affirming hormone therapy, harm reduction, HIV testing and PrEP and more. Maness said the partnership with Shout Your Abortion allows the Women’s Health Center to let people know they’re still there, providing health care for everyone. 

“Essentially, what Women’s Health Center of West Virginia does is look to our community to determine gaps in care, and then we pivot to say, ‘How can we fit how can we fill those gaps? How can we meet those needs?’ We’re going to continue to do that.” 

“Something that’s really important and unique to independent clinics, specifically abortion care providers, is we’re used to providing care to people who are often marginalized and underserved, and we treat people with respect and without judgment,” she said. “And those clinics are unique, and we have people who drive across state lines just to come and get care. And we’ve been providing this care for 50 years, and I hope that we’re going to be providing it for 50 more.”