Johnson, who has authored the books Unplanned and The Walls Are Talking, told reporters in Warsaw on Tuesday she hoped her visit “will help Poles to stay in an anti-abortion attitude.”
“I very much hope that my books will change the approach to abortion,” she said, as cited by the Polish Episcopal Conference, the central authority of the Catholic Church in Poland, on its website.
Johnson once worked as a Planned Parenthood clinic director in Bryan, Texas, but quit her job after she one day viewed an abortion through ultrasound, public broadcaster Polish Radio’s IAR news agency has reported.
Speaking on the first day of her visit to Poland, Johnson told the media she now runs an organisation that helps former abortion workers.
"Today we have helped over 550 abortion workers leave their jobs,” she said at a press conference organised by Poland’s Catholic news agency KAI.
“It’s difficult for workers to leave because the abortion clinics will give them a poor reference for future work," she added.
"For instance, I was their employee of the year and then left, and they said I was a terrible employee."
Johnson also said she was now advocating an outright legal ban on abortion, according to the IAR news agency.
She said: "My message is really one of a warning for Poland and for Polish people. We’ve seen what the liberalisation of abortion in the United States has done. We see the dehumanisation of the unborn … but we also see the dehumanisation of the elderly and those with disabilities.”
Based on her memoirs, published in 2011 under the title Unplanned, a movie of the same title was made last year.
Her 2016 book The Walls Are Talking is billed as a collection of stories told by former abortion clinic workers.
Johnson is scheduled for a series of meetings this week in several Polish cities, including the capital Warsaw and the southern city of Kraków.
On Saturday, she will take part in a conference at the Polish houses of parliament focusing on ways of supporting “pregnant women in crisis,” the IAR news agency reported.
(gs/pk)
Source: IAR, episkopat.pl