In the midst of a public smear campaign launched by the Massachusetts Department of Public Health (DPH) and the pro-abortion group Reproductive Equity Now (REN) to discredit pregnancy resource centers in the state, it was recently discovered that an abortion facility promoted by the DPH failed at least one health inspection due to dozens of health and safety code violations.

Around the time of the Dobbs Supreme Court decision in June 2022 that overturned Roe v. Wade, Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren (D) began a public campaign to discredit and shut down pregnancy resource centers (PRCs) in the state, claiming that they mislead women by pretending to offer abortions. “We need to shut them down here in Massachusetts, and we need to shut them down all around the country,” she stated at the time.

Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey’s (D) administration followed up on Warren’s messaging by launching a “first-in-the-nation public education campaign” in June 2024 to highlight the supposed “dangers and potential harm of anti-abortion centers.” The press release for the campaign claimed that PRCs “often mislead people about their options if they are pregnant.” The campaign was funded “through a $1 million investment that the Massachusetts legislature passed as part of its FY2023 supplemental budget” and was created by the DPH “in collaboration with the Reproductive Equity Now Foundation.”

The media campaign included messaging on social media platforms, web ads, billboards, radio, and bus ads. One billboard ad read, “AVOID Anti-Abortion Centers. They MISLEAD you about your options if you’re pregnant.”

But analysis of the services that PRCs provide paints a much different picture. A report released in November by the Charlotte Lozier Institute found that the 2,775 PRCs (which outnumber abortion facilities three to one) across the country “provided a value of over $452 million in total medical care, support and education services, and material goods” to expectant mothers in 2025 alone (a 48% increase in material goods from 2022). The report further found that “8 in 10 centers are providing free or low-cost medical services, staffed by over 10,000 medical professionals.” The report also found that “client satisfaction rose to 98%.”

In contrast, a pattern of botched abortion procedures and IUD implantations, along with poorly trained staff, outdated medical equipment, and filthy building conditions are plaguing abortion facilities across the country.

In fact, public records show that the very abortion facility that the Massachusetts DPH and Reproductive Equity Now (REN) launched their anti-PRC campaign in front of was cited by the DPH for 38 health and safety code violations in 2018.

Public records obtained by the Massachusetts Family Institute (MFI) and shared with The Washington Stand reveal that Women’s Health Services, located in Brookline, Mass., failed a health inspection on August 1, 2018 due to 38 separate violations. Some of the violations included:

• Non-sterile equipment, including blades and surgical equipment
• Unlabeled “specimen cups” with red liquid in unlocked “research fridge” in recovery room. The nurse manager didn’t know what the specimens were or what research they were being used for.
• Biohazardous waste found in freezers. The nurse manager had no information on how biohazardous waste should be properly disposed of.
• Biohazardous waste found in a closet with foul odor
• Medication/equipment stored in food fridge
• Physicians did not evaluate patients to assess anesthesia risk
• 50 instances of expired equipment, including a defibrillator
• No policies and procedures on medication administration
• No policy on emergency transfer of patients
• No policy on reporting serious events — staff meeting minutes indicated possible reportable events
• Failure to properly maintain an emergency medication kit
• Failed to maintain control over controlled substances, failed to conduct inventory
• Unlabeled medications
• No policies on employee health and safety

After MFI obtained the records from the DPH, they inquired about any records relating to subsequent health inspections, which are legally required to be performed every two years. DPH did not respond to MFI’s inquiry, indicating that the state may not have inspected the facility for the last eight years.

Notably, Dr. Laurent Delli-Bovi, the abortionist at Women’s Health Services, has also come under scrutiny for experimenting on the brains of 22 aborted babies without obtaining the consent of the babies’ mothers. A 2011 paper that Delli-Bovi co-authored noted that since the brains were considered “discarded tissue,” no consent was ever obtained from the mothers. In addition, Delli-Bovi is now embroiled in a lawsuit filed by a couple last year after the remains of their aborted baby were negligently misplaced by a hospital.

“This records request revealed a stunning level of hypocrisy and corruption on the part of Massachusetts government officials,” MFI told The Washington Stand. “While Governor Healey and the Department of Public Health target faith-based pregnancy centers for their pro-life positions, they give dangerous abortion mills a free pass. MFI will continue working to expose this corruption and to hold these officials accountable in court.”

The health inspection failure revelations come amid an ongoing lawsuit, Your Options Medical [YOM] v. Healey, filed by a group of Massachusetts pregnancy resource centers against Governor Healey, the DPH, and REN over the public smear campaign. MFI, in partnership with the American Center for Law and Justice, is representing the PRCs in the lawsuit against the campaign, which they say is “unconstitutional and ideologically driven” and is “aimed at silencing pro-life pregnancy resource centers.” The lawsuit asserts that “state officials, under the direction of Maura Healey, abused their authority to target organizations solely because they offer women real choices rooted in compassion, truth, and life.”

A decision in the case is expected in May.