A federally funded program is teaching pregnancy options counselors how to steer pregnant women towards adoption rather than providing women with unbiased information about all of their options, according to "Out of Compliance? Implementing the Infant Adoption Awareness Act," by Cynthia Dailard, senior public policy analyst with The Alan Guttmacher Institute. The Infant Adoption Awareness Act (IAAA) was created to train health care providers to counsel women facing an unintended pregnancy about adoption "on an equal basis with all other courses of action included in nondirective counseling"-including keeping the baby or having an abortion. However, Dailard's investigation, which is based in part on an analysis conducted by the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute of the training program curriculum, suggests that the trainings violate the IAAA by promoting adoption to the exclusion of all other alternatives.
Both the curriculum and the training program were developed with a $6.1 million federal grant. Interviews with more than 20 counselors in 15 states who have undergone the trainings suggest that the program has not maintained a neutral stance. Although some participants had a positive overall experience, many reported that they were trained to promote adoption and to discourage women from raising their child themselves or choosing abortion. Participants also raised significant concerns about the trainers' negative views of women facing unintended pregnancies, the overtly religious tenor of the discussion and possible violations of professional guidelines and medical ethics.
"The law was designed to ensure that women are aware of adoption and to support women in any option they choose," says Adam Pertman, executive director of the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute. "But the curriculum being used appears to violate both the letter and the spirit of the law. Whether or not to choose adoption is a decision with lifelong implications, and counselors must help women to make this decision by providing accurate information about all their options and respecting their choices."
"It is our hope," says Cynthia Dailard, "that the federal government will take into account the reports of program participants, and support only those training programs that comply with statutory requirements and treat adoption on par with the other options available to women facing an unintended pregnancy."
"Out of Compliance? Implementing the Infant Adoption Awareness Act" appears in the August 2004 issue of The Guttmacher Report on Public Policy.
Click here for an executive summary [LINK] of the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute's analysis of the NCFA training curriculum, and here for a news release [LINK] from the Adoption Institute.