Minnesota Department of Health has released their yearly reporting of data collected on termination services, and once more the abortion rate in the state is declining. According to Minnesota Citizens Concerned for Life (MCCL), the state’s largest anti-choice advocacy group, that’s because of the implementation of the “Positive Alternatives Act,” a bill passed in 2005 to provide “resources” to convince a woman or girl with an unintended pregnancy to chose birth over abortion.

“The numbers speak for themselves: Positive Alternatives is providing women with the resources and support they need to choose life for their unborn babies,” said Scott Fischbach, Executive Director of Minnesota Citizens Concerned for Life (MCCL) in a statement. “More women and teens are rejecting the abortion industry’s message that abortion is the answer to an unexpected pregnancy.”

But is that true? Not at all. If “more women and teens” were choosing to carry their unexpected and unwanted pregnancies to term, there would be an increase in the state’s birth rate. Statistics don’t bear that out.

Minnesota has been experiencing a declining birth rate for years, and it’s been approaching the lowest it has been in 100 years, the state reported last year.

In fact, the state is seeing the same trend as the nation, which is attributed to declining birth rates and abortion rates to better use of birth control.

The Positive Alternatives Act provides state taxpayer funding to crisis pregnancy centers to provide support to women who decide to continue their pregnancies, but these centers do not provide accurate information on or access to birth control and often mislead patients about the effects of using it. 

“Planned Parenthood’s bottom line is that a woman should have accurate information about all of her options,” said Jennifer Auwles, Media Relations Director for
Planned Parenthood Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota. “Information should support a woman, help her make a decision for herself, and enable her to take care of her health and well-being.  Health information should never be given with the intent of coercing, shaming or judging a woman.”

“We remain vigilant in our efforts to protect women’s access to health care at every level. We want to continue seeing good news for women and families – so we will guard against any efforts to undermine women’s access to health care and information.”

Since the birth rate is dropping, and abortions are not rising, it would be fair to speculate that abortions aren’t going down because of Positive Alternatives, but in spite of Positive Alternates, which rejects age-appropriate sex education and reliable birth control information in favor of promoting abstinence and sex only after marriage.

If MCCL is looking to take credit for something, perhaps it should receive congratulations for not getting too much in the way.