Yelp so as to add flags to disaster being pregnant facilities

The on-line opinions web site Yelp stated Tuesday it’s rolling out a brand new characteristic to guard customers searching for abortions from being misled about anti-abortion being pregnant facilities listed on its platform.

Such facilities are sometimes religiously affiliated and deter shoppers from having an abortion.

On Tuesday, Yelp stated it’s going to place a shopper discover on the listings informing customers that the facilities “sometimes present restricted medical companies and will not have licensed medical professionals onsite.”

In 2018, moderators for the San Francisco-based firm started recategorizing listings for such organizations as “disaster being pregnant facilities” or “faith-based disaster being pregnant facilities.” The organizations had beforehand categorized themselves as reproductive well being companies, medical facilities and different well being and medical classes.

“It’s well-reported that disaster being pregnant facilities don’t supply abortion companies, and it’s been proven that many present deceptive info in an try and steer individuals searching for abortion care to different choices,” the corporate stated in a submit on its web site detailing the change.

Yelp’s transfer would possibly put extra strain on Google to do one thing comparable with listings on its web site.

Final week, lots of of Google staff launched a petition calling on the corporate to repair deceptive search outcomes for abortion companies by eradicating “pretend abortion suppliers” and halt its enterprise with “publishers of disinformation associated to abortion companies.”

In June, Democratic lawmakers in Congress additionally urged the corporate to curb the looks of the anti-abortion being pregnant facilities for sure search outcomes. However Republicans pushed again final month, warning the tech big not to take action in a letter despatched by 17 conservative legal professional generals to Google CEO Sundar Pichai.

Google didn’t instantly reply to a request for touch upon Tuesday.

Up to now a number of months, Yelp stated it has additionally been choosing up on efforts to higher match customers looking for abortion clinics with these companies and make it much less probably these customers will see anti-abortion being pregnant facilities in search outcomes. The corporate stated it has evaluated roughly 33,500 listings this 12 months and recategorized almost 470 pages for the facilities.