Program Offers Alternative To Abortion

Since November 2014, Indiana's Pregnancy and Parenting Support Program has served 11,036 clients through 24,162 support service visits in Indiana. The taxpayer-funded program exists to offer women counseling and mentoring support as an alternative to abortion.

Real Alternatives is the statewide administrator for the program. Real Alternatives President and CEO Kevin Bagatta said, "Thanks to this state program, Indiana women who are alone and facing an unexpected pregnancy have another person to assist them, which empowers them to overcome obstacles and pressures so they can choose life for their preborn baby." Real Alternatives uses a growing network of 19 pregnancy support centers and social service agencies in Indiana to provide caring, compassionate, and trained counselors who offer free pregnancy support and parenting education services to women.

In the program's first fiscal year – ending Sept. 30, 2015 – 8,737 women from 47 counties were provided comprehensive counseling, mentoring, education, and support services for up to nine months of pregnancy and 12 months after the births of their babies. The northern regional pilot program received $1million in funding that fiscal year through the Indiana State Department of Health. The program's administrative cost ratio, including start-up, was 8.12 percent. Due to its rapid success, funding for the program has been increased to $3.5 million to provide services statewide to Indiana women.

In July 2015, the Indiana State Department of Health reported that the number of resident abortions performed in Indiana during 2014 rose slightly, to 7,621. Real Alternatives Vice President Thomas Lang pointed out, "With the difficult economic times we have experienced the last couple of years comes increased pressure to abort. For women who come to our program pressured by others to abort, 87 percent no longer consider abortion after receiving services in our program."

Real Alternatives has been providing life-affirming pregnancy support services for 20 years in Pennsylvania. That high performance and fiscally accountable program has assisted more than 260,000 women in need who sought out the program's services. 

Real Alternatives has assisted 12 other states with starting taxpayer-funded programs to offer assistance to women facing unexpected pregnancies. Real Alternatives administers statewide pregnancy and parenting-support-services programs in Pennsylvania, Indiana and Michigan. Women in those states can receive services by going to www.realalternatives.org/PressKit/Video-PACrowd.htm or by calling 1-888-LIFE-AID.