Displaying items by tag: Press Releases

"This is one more evidence that pregnancy help organizations are winning the battle for life."

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Wednesday | January 14, 2015
Contact: Jay Hobbs, Director of Communications and Marketing
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COLUMBUS, OHIO – Responding to a report from LifeSiteNews.com uncovering an ongoing plan between the Maryland chapter of NARAL Pro-Choice America and the public officials in Montgomery County, Md., to impede or eliminate pregnancy help organizations, Heartbeat International President Peggy Hartshorn, Ph.D., pointed to the success of pregnancy centers in her companion article at LifeSiteNews.com.

Read LifeSiteNews.com Report Here: https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/exclusive-e-mails-reveal-maryland-officials-collaborating-with-naral-to-shu

Read Peggy Hartshorn’s Response Here: https://www.lifesitenews.com/opinion/why-do-abortionists-go-to-such-lengths-to-eliminate-us-because-we-threaten

“Heartbeat International and our worldwide network of life-affirming organizations believe no mother should feel so alone, so vulnerable, or so coerced that she ends her child’s life through abortion,” Hartshorn, who has served as Heartbeat International’s President since 1993, wrote. “These vital organizations enable a mother to make a true choice through a variety of services, including ultrasound, options counseling, maternity housing, and the ability to make an adoption plan.”

“And this is why we pose such a threat to NARAL and company. It’s not just that we are their competition. It’s that we are winning.”

Hartshorn’s comments come in the wake of the publication of an email string dating back as far as 2009, obtained via the Freedom of Information Act, which capture ongoing strategy between Maryland’s NARAL chapter president Jodi Finkelstein and current Montgomery County Council president George Leventhal.

The pair discussed the County’s ongoing strategy to compel government speech from Heartbeat International affiliate Centro Tepeyac Silver Spring Women’s Center. Montgomery County first passed a city ordinance Feb. 2, 2010 requiring, “limited service pregnancy resource centers” – any facility that does not perform abortions – to post a sign in English and Spanish in its waiting room saying that “the Center does not have a licensed medical professional on staff” and that “the Montgomery County Health Officer encourages women who are or may be pregnant to consult with a licensed health care provider.”

A lawsuit brought by Alliance Defending Freedom on behalf of Centro Tepeyac resulted in three separate court victories, which finally resulted in the County dropping its unconstitutional ordinance and paying Centro Tepeyac $375,000 in legal fees.

“Pregnancy help organizations like Centro Tepeyac exist so that every mother can feel loved and supported during her pregnancy,” Hartshorn said. “The only opponents to this mission are those who, like NARAL, stand to gain financially and ideologically by the intentional killing of a child within the womb.”

Tweet This: Pregnancy help organizations exist so that every mother can feel loved and supported during pregnancy.

13-year-old saved from abortion to meet with law-makers at Babies Go to Congress

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Monday | December 22, 2014
Contact: Jay Hobbs, Director of Communications and Marketing
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WASHINGTON, D.C. – A little child shall lead them. This well-loved statement will get plenty of airtime this Christmas season, but the phrase may end up becoming the theme of Heartbeat International's Babies Go to Congress® when the most powerful prolife effort on Capitol Hill takes place January 22-23, 2015.

An entourage of five former pregnancy help center clients and their children, rescued from the threat of abortion, will be highlighted by 12-year-old Christiana Pablo from Bowie Crofton Pregnancy Center in Bowie, Md., who is already blossoming into an outgoing champion for the life-affirming support offered by the more than 2,400 pregnancy help organizations rescuing 3,000 babies each week in the United States alone.

Faced with an unexpected pregnancy, Christiana's mother, Victoria Chan-Pablo—only 15-years-old at the time—found the support she needed to welcome Christiana into the world at Bowie Crofton Pregnancy Center. Her eldest daughter has been joyfully repaying that debt, sparking fundraising and community-building efforts for the center, which has served over 24,500 women and families since opening its doors in 1982.

"I say that Bowie Crofton Pregnancy Center saved my daughter's life because they opened up our eyes and gave us the knowledge, the strength and the encouragement to help us carry out our decision in keeping our baby," Victoria said.

Christiana and Victoria will have a chance to tell their story to their elected congressional representatives, along with centers from Ohio (Pregnancy Decision Health Centers), North Carolina (LifeLine Pregnancy Help Center), Indiana (Matrix Pregnancy Resource Center), and Arizona (Living Hope Women's Center). It is the first time in the history of the program that North Carolina will be represented.

Since beginning the program in 2009, a total of 109 women and children representing over 50 centers have visited 222 congressional offices from 23 different states.

"It's difficult to imagine a more empowering experience for a woman than Babies Go to Congress," Peggy Hartshorn, Ph.D., President of Heartbeat International, said. "This is an event that drives to the very heart of what life-affirming work is all about: every mother feeling loved and supported, both during her pregnancy and into parenthood."

Heartbeat International President to receive Defender of Life recognition

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Tuesday | Oct. 7 2014
CONTACT: Jay Hobbs, Director of Communications and Marketing, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

COLUMBUS, OH – Celebrating her nearly 42 years of hands-on involvement in the life-saving ministry of pregnancy help, the last 21 of which as President of Heartbeat International, Peggy Hartshorn, Ph.D., will be honored as a Defender of Life by Students for Life of America, the group announced Tuesday.

The award is set to be presented at Students for Life of America's West National Conference in San Francisco, Calif., on January 25, 2015. Students for Life of America has also announced Professor Robbie George of Princeton University as its East National Conference recipient.

"It is truly an honor to be recognized by an excellent pro-life organization like Students for Life," Hartshorn said. "The work they are doing among high school and college students around the country is remarkable, and I am so thankful to commend with them the great work that pregnancy help organizations are doing every day in every region of the world."

Jolted by the announcement of the U.S. Supreme Court's infamous Roe v. Wade decision Jan. 22, 1973, Hartshorn immersed herself in pro-life work almost immediately, becoming involved in Columbus (Ohio) Right to Life in the following weeks. She and her husband, Mike Hartshorn, then began housing pregnant women in 1974, which led to their realization of a call to begin a pregnancy help organization in 1978.

That call led to the 1981 founding of Pregnancy Decision Health Centers, in Columbus, Ohio, which now serves over 15,000 clients annually in eight locations throughout Central Ohio.

Peggy Hartshorn joined the board of Heartbeat's forerunner organization, Alternatives to Abortion International, in 1986, before taking the reigns as president in 1993. During her tenure, Heartbeat International's umbrella has expanded from around 100 centers to over 1,800, comprising the largest and most expansive pregnancy help network in the world.

Hartshorn's previous awards include the Cardinal John J. O'Connor pro-life award from Legatus International, the Norrine A. and Raymond E. Ruddy Memorial Life Prizes Award, the J.C. Penney Golden Rule Award, the Sanctity of Human Life Award, the Patrick Cardinal O'Boyle Award from the Fellowship of Catholic Scholars, the Founder's Award from the Christ Child Society, the Catholic Woman of the Year Award from the Diocese of Columbus (Ohio), and the President's Volunteer Service Award under President George Bush.

Previous Defenders of Life Award winners include Congressman Christopher Smith (R-NJ), Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar, Father Frank Pavone, Abby Johnson, David Bereit, and Phyllis Schlafly.

"Real women are being silenced and gagged in the process."

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 
Thursday | December 18, 2014
CONTACT: Jay Hobbs, Director of Communications and Marketing This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. 

COLUMBUS, OH – An article first posted Dec. 5 on Vocativ.com before it was picked up at Slate.com and The Daily Mail, among others, calls into question both the demand and medical research behind a treatment designed to reverse the effects of Mifepristone, developed by Dr. George Delgado, M.D., F.A.A.F.P.

Dr. Delgado, who sits on Heartbeat International's Medical Advisory Board, is medical director of Culture of Life Family Health Care and founder of AbortionPillReversal.com, which has built a network of 226 pro-life OB-GYNs who are prepared to provide an early dose of supplemental progesterone to block the effects of Mifepristone—the first of two pills administered in the RU-486 regimen.

"We are grateful for Dr. Delgado's work," Heartbeat International President Peggy Hartshorn, Ph.D., said. "It is a shame to see his good work besmirched by agenda-driven writers, determined to grow the business of abortion.

"The tragic thing is that real women who have either been helped by this treatment or wish that they had been, are being silenced and gagged in the process," Hartshorn said. "Pregnancy help organizations like Dr. Delgado's offer each and every woman the true compassion, support, and choice she deserves."

The articles—released over two years after Heartbeat International reported the site's launch and first distributed a webinar on the procedure through Heartbeat Academy—cite the small sample size of women included in an initial peer-reviewed 2012 report published by Dr. Delgado.

Dr. Delgado's team is currently reviewing its cases from the time of the initial report—which included 28 contacts and four births following ingestion of Mifepristone from May to December 2012.

Neither Dr. Delgado nor his team have been contacted by reporters linked to the recent articles.

“Women deserve better than abortion and the predators who profit from this deadly practice.”                                                                                               

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                                                                               
Monday | December 15, 2014      
CONTACT: Jay Hobbs, Director of Communications & Marketing (media@HeartbeatInternational.org)

COLUMBUS, OH – Responding to breaking news over the weekend of eight additional victims coming forward against the alleged Dr. Nareshkumar Gandalal “Naresh” Patel in Oklahoma City, Heartbeat International has released the following statements:

“Women deserve better than abortion and predators who profit from this deadly practice,” Heartbeat International President Peggy Hartshorn, Ph.D., said. “The shared story of these eight women points to the very reason Heartbeat International’s network of pregnancy help centers, maternity homes, and non-profit adoption exist, which is to provide a pregnant mother with all the information she needs to care for herself and her family during an unexpected pregnancy. 

“Women deserve to know the whole truth. Abortion facilities—Mr. Patel’s is merely the example of the day—often leave out the truth, putting abortion profits above what’s really best for mothers and their babies.

“Our network of pregnancy help organizations offers free services because the life of a mother and her baby are worth more than an abortion facility’s bottom line,” Hartshorn said. "It is tragic, in the case of these eight women, that they were reached by a preditory practicioner in an hour of great vulnerability, rather than a life-affirming voice in a local pregnancy help organization."

Patel was arrested Tuesday, Dec. 9, on charges of “fraud for prescribing abortion-inducing drugs to patients who are not pregnant,” according to a press release issued by Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt. While further investigation is ongoing, Patel’s original charges could result in a three-year jail sentence and a maximum fine of $15,000, according to the press release.