Does the Birth Control Pill Cause Abortions

Cell-signaling, communications between Integrins in the womb and surrounding the traveling egg,
are disrupted and hamper healthy implanting of the embryo into the endometrium. In a 1997 medical
journal, this effect on the endometrium is portrayed in a graphic analogy:
Consider the example of a space shuttle, low on fuel and oxygen, urgently needing to dock with the
space station. The mother ship and the shuttle communicate with each other so that the shuttle knows
which docking bay to go to. Importantly, the mother ship knows which bay to make ready. Successful
communication is imperative. If this electronic communication fails (disrupted embryo-uterine ‘celltalk’)
the shuttle may go to the wrong docking bay, fail to attach to the mother ship, drift away, with
the result that the crew dies from a lack of food and oxygen. Alternately, the shuttle might go to the
right bay but find that all the docking apparatus is not in place. Again, the attachment between the
two fails due to faulty communication and the crew dies…. To continue the analogy, the Integrins could
be thought of as grappling hooks that ‘hold’ the human embryo onto the womb whilst the process of
implantation is completed. 38
Typically, the new person attempts to implant at six days after conception. If implantation is
unsuccessful, the child is flushed out of the womb in a miscarriage that may appear to be nothing
more than a normal, even if delayed, menstruation. While there are many spontaneous miscarriages,
whenever the miscarriage is the result of an environment created by a foreign device or chemical, it
is an artificially induced miscarriage, which is, in fact, an abortion. This is true even if the mother
does not intend it, is not aware of it happening, and would be horrified if she knew.
If the embryo is still viable when it reaches the uterus, underdevelopment of the uterine lining
caused by the Pill prevents implantation. The embryo dies and the remains are passed along in the
next bleeding episode, which, incidentally, is not a true menstruation, even though it is usually
perceived as such. 39
Research Findings Back to the 1970’s
One of the things that surprised me in my research was that though many recent sources testify to
the Pill’s abortive capacity, it has actually been well established for three decades. In 1966 Dr. Alan
Guttmacher, former director of Planned Parenthood, said this about the Pill’s effect on the uterine
lining:
The appearance of the endometrium differs so markedly from a normal premenstrual endometrium that
one doubts it could support implantation of a fertilized egg. 40
The following nine sources are all from the 1970s. (Keep in mind that the term “blastocyst” refers to
the newly conceived human being—“it” is not a thing, but a person, a “he” or “she.”)
Dr. Daniel R. Mishell of the USC School of Medicine said,
Furthermore, [the combination pills] alter the endometrium so that glandular production of glycogen
is diminished and less energy is available for the blastocyst to survive in the uterine cavity. 41
Dr. J. Richard Crout, president of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), said this of combination
birth control pills:
Fundamentally, these pills take over the menstrual cycle from the normal endocrine mechanisms. And
in so doing they inhibit ovulation and change the characteristics of the uterus so that it is not
receptive to a fertilized egg. 42
In 1970, J. Peel and M. Potts’s Textbook of Contraceptive Practice acknowledged this: