CLAIM: Consuming pineapple juice, sesame seeds, parsley water with lemon or large amounts of aspirin are viable methods to end a pregnancy.
AP’S ASSESSMENT: False. These home “remedies” don’t induce abortion, and taking large doses of aspirin can harm the gastrointestinal tract, according to doctors.
THE FACTS: In the month since the U.S. Supreme Court stripped away constitutional protections for abortion, freeing states to ban the procedure, social media users have spread misinformation about methods to end a pregnancy at home.
However, doctors say that while people can self-manage their abortions at home using abortion pills such as misoprostol, they shouldn’t follow home remedies they find on social media to end a pregnancy as they are not effective and can sometimes be dangerous.
Among the purported “home remedies” promoted in a widely shared video on Facebook were pineapple juice, sesame seeds, parsley water and aspirin tablets.
The video claimed people who want to end their pregnancy can drink pineapple juice because it contains an ingredient called bromelain that can “soften the cervix” and “will eventually lead to a miscarriage.” The video also touted three other false suggestions: sesame seeds soaked in honey, parsley water with lemon and four to 10 aspirin tablets with water as alleged methods to induce an abortion or start the menstrual cycle.
There is no truth to any of these claims, said Dr. Eve Feinberg, an associate professor of obstetrics and gynecology at...
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