Republicans Are Using Exceptions to Sell Their Abortion Bans. It’s a Scam.
Exceptions for rape, incest, and medical emergencies are incredibly hard for pregnant people to actually use—and that’s a feature, not a bug.

By Carter Sherman
April 27, 2023

This week, North Dakota’s governor signed into law one of the country’s most extreme abortion bans. It outlaws almost all abortions—and only allows people to get abortions in cases of rape or incest if they undergo the procedure within the first six weeks of pregnancy.

The ban is, for now, an act of political theater. No one is going to an abortion clinic in North Dakota, because the last clinic in the state moved to Minnesota months ago. But the exceptions in the ban are also likely meaningless. Many people do not even realize that they are pregnant at six weeks, and many sexual assault survivors can take far longer to come forward, if they ever do.

Continued: https://www.vice.com/en/article/4a3wvq/republicans-abortion-ban-exceptions

27.04.2023

Opinion

abortion exceptionalism

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The FDA’s Abortion Announcement Is Not What You Think

The FDA just reinforced “abortion exceptionalism” in health care and added paternalistic busywork for pharmacists dispensing medication abortion.

By Renee Bracey Sherman, Dr. Daniel Grossman and Tracy Weitz
JANUARY 6, 2023

This week, the Food and Drug Administration announced that it would allow mifepristone, the first pill taken in the two-drug medication abortion regimen, to be dispensed at retail pharmacies. The FDA’s decision is a welcome move that has garnered headlines, but the fine print contains significant red tape that will continue to serve as a barrier for people already struggling to access medical care.

Because of “abortion exceptionalism” allowing abortion care (and miscarriage management) to be treated differently from other health care, medication abortion has always been more regulated than it should be. When the FDA approved the drug in 2000, it did so under a little-known bureaucratic system known as the Risk Evaluation Mitigation Strategy (REMS). Drugs under REMS usually carry significant side effects or are highly addictive, neither of which is true for mifepristone. Under these restrictions, clinicians who provide medication abortion must register with the FDA and then dispense mifepristone directly to the patient. As Renee and Dr. Grossman wrote last year, this requirement has made it impossible for mifepristone to be available over the counter, or at the very least to be dispensed without unnecessary certifications, despite the fact that it’s safer than Tylenol.

Continued: https://www.thenation.com/article/society/fda-medication-abortion-pharmacies/

06.01.2023

Commentary

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USA – Coronavirus crisis magnifies existing challenges to abortion access

Coronavirus crisis magnifies existing challenges to abortion access

May 07, 2020
Carole Joffe

In our recent book, Obstacle Course: The Everyday Struggle to Get an Abortion in America, David Cohen and I detail the considerable difficulties many people have in accessing abortion care. The relative scarcity of clinics means long travel for many; that abortion patients are disproportionately low-income women of color means hardship in paying for the procedure, particularly since the majority of states do not allow Medicaid funds to be used for abortion; the onerous waiting periods in many states often mean women have to stay overnight in a distant city, leading to the additional costs of lodging and more days of lost wages; confrontations with protestors at the clinic sites themselves can often be deeply upsetting. All these barriers have increased exponentially with the coming of COVID-19, and some new problems have been added as well.

Continued: https://womensmediacenter.com/news-features/coronavirus-crisis-magnifies-existing-challenges-to-abortion-access

USA – The Next Big Abortion Case Comes Down to John Roberts

The Next Big Abortion Case Comes Down to John Roberts

By Irin Carmon, The Intelligencer
Feb. 28, 2020

Almost four years ago, I sat on a cable-news set waiting for the Supreme Court to hand down a ruling on a Texas abortion law that, reputable medical organizations agreed, amounted to a bogus justification for shutting down abortion clinics. The live feed was trained on candidate Hillary Clinton’s Cincinnati rally, featuring Elizabeth Warren, who had just endorsed her.

Alike in blonde bobs and jewel tones, if not much else, the two raised their clasped hands to the sky in a show of party unity and the hint of an all-female ticket, or at least a future in which reproductive autonomy, along with everything else, didn’t depend on the whims of a tiny number of white men. The particular man we were waiting on that day was Justice Anthony Kennedy. Minutes later, the networks cut away to announce that his vote in Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt would keep the clinics open, ruling that the Texas law placed an unconstitutional burden on women.

Continued: https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/02/john-roberts-choice.html