Innovative project connects pregnant women with real help

If every pregnant woman facing difficult circumstances could be assured she had the resources to carry her baby to term, do you think abortion numbers would drop? It’s quite possible that a new initiative of Save the Storks will do just that, and more.

Intended for locations usually outside the reach of pregnancy centers, such as bars, nightclubs, restaurants, and universities, the new Assure Me Dispensers will offer both pregnancy tests and Date Rape Drug Detection Kits.

Assure Me is in a pilot test until early 2017, and will be tested in San Antonio, Texas, and three locations in Colorado: Westminster, Pueblo, and Steamboat Springs. Packaging on the pregnancy tests will direct women to local pregnancy resource centers through a national hotline available 24/7. These centers will help test the hypothesis that the dispensers will reach a large number of abortion-vulnerable women, perhaps more than other avenues of advertising or outreach.

Since we know “before or within the first 24 hours of discovering their crisis pregnancy, the majority of abortion-determined women and men decide whether or not they will choose life for their unborn child,” Save the Storks is now making it easier to connect with a pregnancy center in that window. Women who call pregnancy centers usually make that call several days later, according to Joe Baker, founder of Save the Storks. Women are benefited when they are able to contact a center – right away – that actually gives them the aid they need instead of pushing abortion on them and failing to give them full and accurate information and care.

The Date Rape Drug Detection Kit comes in sets of 10 test strips which can detect the illicit date rape drugs GHB and ketamine in both alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages. Providing these kits assures women that affiliated pregnancy centers don’t just have an agenda to stop abortion. They care about the whole woman and will be prepared to be a resource no matter what.

“Assure Me has the capacity to change how we reach abortion-minded women,” Shara Pierce, Save the Stork’s Programs Development Specialist, says. “The pro-life movement has often had a ‘find us when you need us’ mentality about reaching these women in their most critical decision-making moments. Now we are strategically placing ourselves where they are at that time. Women should feel heard, supported, and empowered when facing such a huge life-changing decision.”

Save the Storks was founded in 2011 by Joe and Ann Baker with the goal of launching mobile medical units across the country. Since then, their vision has expanded to help change the pro-life and pregnancy center movements to incorporate innovation, creativity, and new ideas, such as Assure Me, to promote a culture of life.

“We hope that Assure Me will raise awareness for the positive help that is available to women facing an unexpected pregnancy. We hope that more women will have the opportunity to be empowered to choose life for their unborn baby because they were heard and supported when they found help in an unexpected place, like the bathroom of their local night club.”

To find out how you can help bring Assure Me to your community, visit their website for more information.