USA – A ‘dangerous precedent’: Doctors and patient advocates fear restricted access to abortion pill

The Supreme Court will hear oral arguments Tuesday in a case that could limit access to mifepristone.

March 25, 2024
By Berkeley Lovelace Jr.

About two years after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, the court on Tuesday will revisit the issue of reproductive rights, this time contemplating whether to limit access to mifepristone, the first of two pills used in medication abortion.

Ahead of oral arguments and eventual ruling, doctors and patient advocates are expressing alarm about what might happen if the high court decides to tighten access to the drug.

Continued: https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/doctors-fear-restricted-access-abortion-pill-mifepristone-rcna144955


Nigeria – Police in manhunt for fleeing nurse over failed abortion

25th March 2024
By Uthman Salami

A yet-to-be-identified nurse in Oke-Owa in the Ijebu Ode area of Ogun State is currently on the run after allegedly carrying out an abortion on one Deborah Sokoya.

According to the information made available to PUNCH Metro by a police source, the said abortion failed, leading to serious bleeding and the subsequent hospitalisation of the victim.

Continued: https://punchng.com/police-in-manhunt-for-fleeing-nurse-over-failed-abortion


‘Cruel’: the supreme court could send one-time abortion deserts like Hawaii back in time

States in which abortion is legal but was long inaccessible have benefitted from the FDA’s expansion of a key abortion drug

Carter Sherman
Sun 24 Mar 2024

They treated a patient who had wanted to get pregnant, but decided to get an abortion rather than have a child with her abusive partner. They treated patients who had lost their houses in the 2023 Maui fires, found themselves homeless and pregnant, and wanted abortions. They treated patients who got pregnant after someone tampered with their birth control and patients who could not afford to take time off work to have an abortion.

Colleen Bass and Sharon Offley, two certified nurse midwives from Hawaii, were able to do all of that because the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) decided, over the last decade, to expand the availability of a common abortion pill.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/mar/24/hawaii-mifepristone-abortion-pill


UK – Senior Labour figures seeking to water down plans to decriminalise abortion

MPs due to have free vote on proposal but some in party have privately expressed concerns it goes too far

Eleni Courea Political correspondent
Sat 23 Mar 2024

Senior Labour figures want to water down proposed legislation to decriminalise abortion in England and Wales ahead of a historic Commons debate on the issue.

Later this spring, MPs are due to have a free vote on a proposal by the Labour MP Diana Johnson to abolish the criminal offence associated with a woman ending her own pregnancy.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/mar/23/senior-labour-figures-seeking-water-down-plans-decriminalise-abortion


Many people now rely on telehealth to access abortion pills — but the Supreme Court could change that

Next week, the court will hear arguments in a case that could restrict the use of mifepristone, which a growing number of Americans get without an in-person appointment.

Shefali Luthra, Health Reporter
March 20, 2024

A Supreme Court battle that will play out next week over how patients access mifepristone — one of the two drugs used in a medication abortion — could have sweeping consequences for Americans, regardless of their state’s abortion laws.

In recent years, Americans seeking to terminate their pregnancies have come to increasingly rely on the pills, with medication now making up a majority of all abortions.

Continued: https://19thnews.org/2024/03/telehealth-abortion-pill-access-supreme-court/


Malawi – Media asked to question Govt why Termination of Pregnancy Bill is not being tabled in Parliament

March 21, 2024
Watipaso Mzungu JNR

A consortium of civil society organizations (CSOs) implementing Breaking the Barriers Project has made an impassionate appeal to the media in the country to question why, up to now, government is reluctant to table the Termination of Pregnancy Bill in Parliament.

Continued: https://www.nyasatimes.com/media-asked-to-question-govt-why-termination-of-pregnancy-bill-is-not-being-tabled-in-parliament/


Nigeria – Stakeholders call for coalition to stop unintended pregnancy, unsafe abortion

by Sade Oguntola 
March 21, 2024

THE consensus among stakeholders working around reproductive health is that tackling the menace of unintended pregnancy and unsafe abortion in Nigeria will require stakeholders to build collaboration and networks in order to address the problem effectively.

The stakeholders, speaking at the National Forum on Unintended Pregnancy and Unsafe Abortion in Nigeria, organised by the Partnership for Advancing Abortion in Nigeria (PAARRUAN), with support from the Guttmacher Institute of the United States of America, said the coalition will not only ensure that unintended pregnancy and unsafe abortion gain attention, but will also afford to share talents, skills and resources to effect change.

Continued: https://tribuneonlineng.com/stakeholders-call-for-coalition-to-stop-unintended-pregnancy-unsafe-abortion/


Siege days are over: how Northern Ireland came to lead the UK on abortion

The chilling atmosphere of pickets and protests at clinics has given way to a new ‘gold standard’ of care

Rory Carroll,  Ireland correspondent
Thu 21 Mar 2024

The family planning advisers at Shaftesbury Square still remember the days of siege when anti-abortion protesters staked out the front and rear entrance of their office in central Belfast.

Some pickets would splash holy water on the doors and daub salt crosses on the pavement while others would thrust leaflets with pictures of babies and foetuses at woman entering or leaving the building, and sometimes follow them.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/mar/21/how-northern-ireland-came-to-lead-the-uk-on-abortion


USA – Abortion influences everything

By inhibiting drug development, economic growth, and military recruitment, as well as driving doctors away from the places they’re needed most, bans almost certainly harm you — yes, you.

By Keren Landman, MD
Mar 20, 2024

Last year in Texas, federal Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk ruled that, based on his read of some very bad science, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) needed to withdraw its approval of the safe and widely used abortion drug mifepristone. He claimed that the FDA hadn’t adequately considered its safety (it had) and that the lack of restrictions on the drug (there were plenty) had led to many deaths and severe adverse events (demonstrably false).

… Restricting abortion means removing women’s control over not only their bodies, but also their futures — and giving that control to someone else. In a nation where sex education and contraception access are already spotty and about half of all pregnancies are unplanned, that act is a population-level assault on women’s autonomy. The result is a psychic wound even to those who aren’t seeking abortions.

Continued: https://www.vox.com/even-better/24106111/abortion-mifepristone-kacsmaryk-fda-economic-military-readiness-mortality-mental-health-poverty


Trial date set for pair accused of poison-induced abortion

[Editors' note: Abortion pills are life-saving, not poison]

March 20, 2024
By Chloe Harcombe, BBC News, West of England

A trial date has been set for two people accused of obtaining drugs to illegally abort a baby.

Elliott Benham, 24, of Wingfield, Swindon, and Sophie Harvey, 24, of St Mary's Road, Cirencester, are alleged to have used "poison" to cause a miscarriage, before concealing the dead infant.

The prosecution's case is that the defendants bought the drugs from India.

Continued: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-gloucestershire-68617538