Abortion Helpline, This is Lisa: A Short Film
Ashka Shah
Abortion Helpline, This is Lisa is a 13 minute short film created by Barbara Attie, Janet Goldwater, and Mike Attie. It covers the daily work of a group of women who work at an abortion helpline in Pennsylvania. The helpline helps people who cannot afford to get an abortion cover the cost of their procedure. The organization is called the Women’s Medical Fund and the helpline workers, all named “Lisa” to maintain their anonymity, answer calls and interview the women on what their situation is and how much additional funding they will need. Donors provide the funding, and every shift has a certain amount of allocated funding that the Lisas can give out that day to women who call into the line.
The main goal of the short film is to advocate against the Hyde Amendment. The Hyde Amendment is a federal law that went into effect in 1977 that states that federal funds can not be used to cover an abortion. This effectively made it impossible for women on Medicaid to receive an abortion, given that without insurance an abortion at 4 weeks pregnant can be $450 and an abortion in the second trimester can be upwards of $3000. During the congressional hearing where the Hyde Amendment was discussed, Henry Hyde, the Republican who introduced the bill, explicitly stated, “We cannot save the unborn of the rich… thank God we can save some of the children of the poor, and that’s what I want to do”. This is so blatantly controlling against lower-income and minority people, and it completely shocked me. How could he say that in public? And how could people agree? I thought the inclusion of this quote in the film, and the inclusion of the subsequent reactions from Democrats really drove home how outdated and discriminatory the law truly is.
Additionally, although reproductive health workers can be negatively portrayed and stereotyped in the media, I think that this short film does a really good job of portraying them in a positive light: as a team of hardworking women put into a rough and draining job, who only want the best for their patients. The job can be so stressful because the helpline workers basically need to make judgment calls on who they think deserves to receive the limited available funding left for the week. This can mean choosing between an eleven-year old who was raped or a single mother of three who has cancer and needs an abortion to continue treatment.
The structure of the short film also helps to make it very emotional. It describes the very heart wrenching stories of women in desperate need of an abortion and the subsequent discussion among the Lisas on how they wish things were different. Adding so many details into the short film humanizes everyone involved in the care cascade and definitely adds complexity to the decision to receive an abortion by addressing factors such as domestic violence, other children, underlying health conditions, high risk pregnancies, stimulus check dates, familial support, being in school, ability to work, and fetal abnormality.
The directors did a very good job with their storytelling and overall, I would give this film 4.5/5 stars! It is a must for policymakers and citizens alike to watch!
P.S. If you are interested in watching it, it is available for free online through the Duke Libraries:
find.library.duke.edu/catalog/DUKE009967022
and for more info check out this link: