ACOG Statement on Attempts to Intimidate Health Care Professionals

The following is a statement from Maureen G. Phipps, MD, MPH, FACOG, chief executive officer of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, about the public and inflammatory naming of clinicians who provide abortion care:

“Clinicians who provide abortion care are regularly subject to threats, intimidation, and even violence. This is inexcusable. By publicizing the name of any obstetrician–gynecologist who provides compassionate, lifesaving care to people in need of it, news outlets are cruelly exposing them to very real danger. If such behavior continues, it will cost lives – not just of patients but of the clinicians who are dedicated to them. In a specialty where violent attacks on our colleagues is not new, we are highly aware of how wrong this behavior is and we wholly condemn it.”