"However much you deny the truth, the truth goes on existing.”  George Orwell[1]

 

Once upon a time—way back in the 1960s and 1970s—there were stories of “experiments” conducted on unborn babies so awful that we could not—would not—believe they were true. Granted, these stories that put Josef Mengele to shame were not widely publicized, thus allowing “scientists” the luxury to torture unborn babies to their—the “scientists”—hearts’ content.

 

To take just one hideous example,

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At the University of Helsinki in Finland, Dr. Peter Adam of Case Western Reserve University participated in experiments on unborn babies of up to 21 week's gestation who were aborted by hysterotomy. The babies were kept alive, and then their heads were cut off (the researchers thought that such a term was too grisly to use, so they employed the words "isolating surgically from the other organs").[2]

 

But those were the bad old days, right? In later years, there were tamer stories, such as the “dreaded complication” (babies who survived an abortion)[3]; harvesting fetal tissue—and whole organs for fun and profit[4]; aborting late-late term babies in such a manner that they were born alive and then severing their spinal cords, etc., etc.[5]

 

Come to think of it, the more things change….

 

You get the picture. Industrial strength inhumanity, but all for the “best” of reasons.

 

 

Regardless of what is done with their babies’ remains, clever devils that they are, the Abortion Industry never tires of trying to convince women that they have found a way to hush their consciences.

 

“Nothing spoils a good story like the arrival of an eyewitness.” Mark Twain[6]

 

Enter “Patient-Centered Pregnancy Tissue Viewing.” We have no idea when this obscene attempt to normalize the destruction of a human first began. We recently ran across a fact sheet circulated by the Later Abortion Initiative,[7] part of Ibis Reproductive Health, that was published in 2021, and a medical journal article regurgitating basically the same “patient-centered pregnancy tissue viewing” (PCV) that provides the patient with “the option to look.”[8]

 

PCV is couched in language intended to lull to sleep a woman’s natural protective instinct. The practice is described as a “compassionate, client-driven option” that allows women to view the “products of conception” following an abortion.

 

What does that mean in English? “PCV is an option that allows the client to look at and sometimes touch their products of conception after a pregnancy termination.”

 

In other words, the woman is offered the option of seeing her baby’s dead body, often shredded to pieces, and, if her baby is sufficiently developed, “touch” them.

 

What benefit does this allegedly offer besides the possibility to "memorize the fetus"?[9]  Glad you asked. “Patient-centered care, also called client-centered care, is an essential tenet of high-quality health care by which clients are actively involved in their own treatment and are respected, informed, and listened to.”

 

Get it? The woman is “taking agency.”

 

In reality, it is a macabre attempt to normalize abortion and obscure the truth of what has taken place: the deliberate destruction of an innocent human life.

 

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The Reality Behind “Pregnancy Tissue”

 

The language used in the fact sheet is striking. By referring to the remains of an aborted child as “pregnancy tissue” or “products of conception,” abortion advocates work hard to dehumanize the preborn baby. This is intentional.

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By using deliberately vague language, pro-abortion ideologues seek to distance both the abortionist and the woman from the reality that abortion does not simply remove “tissue”—it ends the life of a preborn child. When clinics offer women the “option” to view the remains, they are acknowledging, even if indirectly, that what was destroyed in the abortion is not just “tissue.” Indeed, the fact sheet admits that abortionists often struggle with showing women “recognizable fetal parts”–particularly in later abortions, “[M]ore education is often provided to prepare the client to see potentially recognizable fetal parts”[10]

 

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Exploiting Grief and Confusion

 

The abortion industry claims that PCV is designed to “destigmatize abortion, provide feelings of relief and closure for clients, and assist with the grieving process.” But what kind of “closure” can come from the sight of one’s own child’s dismembered body? Instead of acknowledging the profound harm caused by abortion, the practice risks deepening trauma, which the fact sheet subtly acknowledges, especially when the baby is more fully developed.

 

Providers report feeling mostly positive about the experience when the pregnancy is in the first trimester, though they report barriers to facilitation, including concern and discomfort about showing the client recognizable fetal parts if the pregnancy is at a later gestation, and a lack of accurate training materials. PCV benefits the client, who may have their questions answered and obtain a sense of closure after their abortion, and the provider, who has the chance to practice evidence-based care and strengthen their commitment to providing abortion care. Abortion providers who hope to enhance client-centered care in their practices should consider providing a PCV option to their clients.[11]

 

The fact sheet even describes special accommodations in cases of late-term abortions, such as swaddling the remains of the baby or offering memorial certificates. These are practices typically reserved for grieving parents after a miscarriage or stillbirth. To see them applied in the context of an abortion is deeply disturbing. It further exposes the contradiction at the heart of the abortion industry: recognizing the humanity of the child only after his or her life has been deliberately ended.

 

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A Tool for Normalization

 

By turning the viewing of their baby’s remains into an optional, almost therapeutic exercise, abortion advocates hope to reduce the stigma and moral weight attached to abortion.

 

But the stigma exists for a reason. Abortion ends a human life. Glossing over that fact with sanitized terminology and staged “closure” rituals does not change the reality.

 

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What This Reveals About the Industry

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Finally, perhaps the most revealing aspect of this initiative is not what it says about women, but the emotional toll it can take on the abortionist and staff themselves. The fact sheet admits that staff often feel discomfort, ambivalence, or emotional strain when facilitating PCV.

 

Providers who facilitate PCV may have very different experiences and must consider the balance between client needs and their own comfort. In Hann and Becker’s study, half of the clinic administrators expressed experiencing barriers to providing PCV, including concern about client reactions, a paucity of training resources, staff discomfort, and staff members not understanding clients’ rationale for requesting to view their tissue.[12]

 

What to do? They “provided specific staff training on fetal development and how to discuss it with clients.”[13]

 

Of course, there are further “barriers” that,

 

included the additional time needed to prepare patients to view their tissue during the education and counselling process, patients being “too squeamish” to view medical products containing blood, and concern about emotional patient reactions to seeing fetal tissue.[14]

 

But the real solution was repetition. Desensitization followed as night follows day.

 

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A Call to Confront the Truth

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National Right to Life believes women deserve authentic compassion and support, not euphemisms and staged “coping mechanisms” that mask the violence of abortion. True empowerment comes from life-affirming options: prenatal care, adoption services, and community support for mothers and families.

 

“Patient-centered pregnancy tissue viewing” does not empower women. It exploits their grief and attempts to make the unacceptable acceptable. At its core, it is an admission of the humanity of the unborn child—a humanity that cannot be denied, no matter how carefully the abortion industry tries to conceal it.

 

We must reject efforts to normalize abortion and instead work toward a culture that acknowledges the dignity of every human life, from conception to natural death. Anything less—any nonsense that abortion is “redeemed” by “patient-centered pregnancy tissue viewing”—betrays not only the unborn, but also the women who are told that their best “option” is to participate in their child’s destruction.

 

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[1] George Orwell (1987). “The complete works of George Orwell: Animal farm.” Accessed 26 Aug. 2025

[2] “Live Experiments,” Life Institute. https://thelifeinstitute.net/learning-centre/issues/fetal-experiments/live-experiments#. Accessed 26 Aug. 2025.

[3] Liz Jeffries and Rick Edmonds, “Abortion: The Dreaded Complication,” The Philadelphia Inquirer, August 2, 1981

[4] Planned Parenthood Headquarters Seeks $1,500 “Financial Incentive” Per Aborted Fetal Liver in New Full Undercover Video – The Center for Medical Progress https://www.centerformedicalprogress.org/2024/07/planned-parenthood-headquarters-seeks-1500-financial-incentive-per-aborted-fetal-liver-in-new-full-undercover-video/

[5] Report of the Grand Jury in the Kermit Gosnell case. https://cdn.cnsnews.com/documents/Gosnell,%20Grand%20Jury%20Report.pdf

[6] “Mark Twain Quote.” A-Z Quotes, https://www.azquotes.com/quote/583220. Accessed 26 Aug. 2025.

[7] Later Abortion Initiative, Ibis Reproductive Health. https://www.ibisreproductivehealth.org/sites/default/files/files/publications/Later%20Abortion%20Initiative.%20What%20is%20pregnancy%20tissue%20viewing.%20Jan%202021.pdf

[8] Hann, Lena R, and Andréa Becker. “The Option to Look: Patient-Centred Pregnancy Tissue Viewing at Independent Abortion Clinics in the United States.” Sexual and Reproductive Health Matters, vol. 28, no. 1, p. 1730122, https://doi.org/10.1080/26410397.2020.1730122. Accessed 26 Aug. 2025.

[9] Ibid.

[10] Later Abortion Initiative, Ibis Reproductive Health. https://www.ibisreproductivehealth.org/sites/default/files/files/publications/Later%20Abortion%20Initiative.%20What%20is%20pregnancy%20tissue%20viewing.%20Jan%202021.pdf

[11]  Later Abortion Initiative, Ibis Reproductive Health. https://www.ibisreproductivehealth.org/sites/default/files/files/publications/Later%20Abortion%20Initiative.%20What%20is%20pregnancy%20tissue%20viewing.%20Jan%202021.pdf

[12] Later Abortion Initiative, Ibis Reproductive Health. https://www.ibisreproductivehealth.org/sites/default/files/files/publications/Later%20Abortion%20Initiative.%20What%20is%20pregnancy%20tissue%20viewing.%20Jan%202021.pdf

[13] Ibid.

[14] Ibid.

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