Ending Roe v. Wade May Have Had the Opposite Effect That Conservatives Had Hoped For

BY DAVID S. COHEN AND CAROLE JOFFE
NOV 07, 2023

On Tuesday, Ohio voters passed a ballot measure enshrining the right to an abortion in the state constitution, joining several states where voters have responded to the end of Roe v. Wade by protecting reproductive rights via popular referendum. We recently learned, however, that even without these votes, reproductive rights might be safer than many expected following the end of Roe in 2022.

When the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the conventional wisdom was that there would be a steep drop in the number of abortions in the United States. As it turns out, though, conventional wisdom was wrong. To many observers’ surprise, two recent studies reveal that national abortion numbers have actually slightly increased since the Supreme Court ended Roe. Based on everything we know about abortion seekers and providers, however, that abortion numbers would go up in the face of Supreme Court retrenchment should have been exactly what was predicted.

Continued: https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2023/11/ohio-vote-abortion-access-is-growing.html

Defiant: Stories From Abortion Providers on the Front Lines

May 2, 2023
National Women’s Law Center

Introducing: Defiant: Stories From Abortion Providers on the Front Lines, a collection of interviews with abortion providers in states across the country telling the stories of their work and lives, in their own words.

Six providers share the obstacles they have faced as health care professionals when trying to provide abortion care, including employment discrimination, challenges to their medical licenses, and threats of violence. They also reflect on the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision overturning Roe v. Wade, and its impact on their ability to provide abortion care.

Continued: https://nwlc.org/resource/defiant-stories-from-abortion-providers-on-the-front-lines/

02.05.2023

Interviews/Podcasts

Videos/Images

abortion providers

defiant abortion providers

Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health

Dr. Atsuko Koyama

Dr. Leah Torres

Dr. Melanie MacLennan

National Women’s Law Center

Abortion bans are a threat to patients. Doctors can and should resist them.

By M. Gregg Bloche and Sarah K. Werner
August 18, 2022

Initial reaction to the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade has cast doctors as powerless — unable to protect their patients from an onslaught of state laws that compel people to bear children. But physicians do have power, and they can — and should — resist the threat that forced-birth laws pose to patients’ lives and well-being.

The states where abortion bans have already taken effect or are likely to in the near future all include exceptions that empower the medical profession to protect pregnant patients. These exceptions vary by state, but they all allow physicians some discretion to conclude that abortion is medically necessary and therefore lawful. They include language authorizing doctors to judge that continuing a pregnancy endangers a patient’s life; some, such as the Texas law, also permit physicians to terminate pregnancy in the event of “serious risk of substantial impairment of a major bodily function.”

Continued: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/08/18/abortion-bans-threat-doctors-standards-overcome/

18.08.2022

prosecuting providers for abortion

5 Abortion Providers on How Bans Are Putting People's Lives in Danger
“All of a sudden, we have to say, ‘I would do this in a heartbeat if I could—but I can’t.’”

By Reina Sultan
August 5, 2022

Abortion is now banned in 10 states, severely limited in another four, and threatened in about half of the country, in total. In states where exceptions may be made in cases of rape or incest, or for the sake of a patient’s life or well-being, guidelines are vague about what kind of abortion or abortion-adjacent care is still legal. This has left providers to decipher the unclear exception rules—and contend with the potential for prosecution, should they guess wrong. Abortion funds and practical support organizations have mobilized to provide resources to abortion seekers however they can. But, of course, they’re unable to offer many of the crucial in-person abortion services that so many patients continue to seek.

Continued: https://www.vice.com/en/article/3addmv/abortion-providers-on-bans-after-roe-overturned-interview

05.08.2022

Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization

USA – Our Father Was An Abortion Doctor Before And After Roe. Here’s What We Learned From Him.

"He would tell us about conservative public figures who would thank him because he’d discreetly helped them."

By Daniel Glick
Jun 27, 2022

Our father was an obstetrician/gynecologist. Over the course of his career, he delivered countless babies, performed surgeries and counseled families. He also provided abortions. Before Roe v. Wade legalized abortion in 1973, he treated women with perforated uteruses, septic shock, hemorrhages and other tragic consequences of illegal abortions and “back-alley” procedures, many of them performed by unsanitary, untrained hands.

Continued: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/eugene-glick-abortion-doctor-father_n_62b8c8f1e4b0cdccbe6d569d

27.06.2022

Why I’m becoming an abortion provider now

Chris Ahlbach
October 24, 2020

With the vacancy on the Supreme Court, Roe v. Wade currently faces the biggest threat in our lifetime. Although Roe was insufficient in securing access to abortion for many people in the US, its repeal would catapult us into an era where one of the safest and most common medical procedures known becomes illegal in many states. For decades, abortion has occupied a politicized space in American medicine, leading to this impending crisis of millions of people losing access to this health service. No matter what happens with Roe, I choose to advocate to expand access to health care, including abortion, and call on my fellow health care providers to join me in this moral work.

Continued: https://www.alternet.org/2020/10/why-im-becoming-an-abortion-provider-now/

Abortion is Healthcare: 28 Providers

INTERNATIONAL SAFE ABORTION DAY 28 September 2019

Abortion is Healthcare: 28 Providers

A newsletter from the International Campaign for Women's Right to Safe Abortion, featuring the stories of 28 abortion providers, in honour of September 28.

Continued: https://mailchi.mp/safeabortionwomensright/abortion-is-healthcare-28-providers-for-international-safe-abortion-day?e=372dd34034

28.09.2019

abortion is healthcare

abortion providers

International Campaign for Women’s Right to Safe Abortion

International Safe Abortion Day

September 28

stories from abortion providers

Dr. Gabrielle Goodrick is the owner and medical director of Camelback Family Planning,

An Open Letter to Doctors – Safe Abortion Is In Your Hands Now, Are You Ready to Step Up?

drgoodrick
Posted on July 30, 2018

Roe v. Wade is in immediate jeopardy and we are now staring into the face of a country without legal abortion, and regardless of where you stand on the issue it is imperative that you understand that it is you who are now in professional jeopardy. As an abortion provider from Arizona, a state with some of the most conservative abortion laws in the nation, let me tell you what you can expect if abortion becomes illegal either in your state, or across the nation as a whole.

Expect every medical decision to be questioned. Do you have a patient who needs a D&C to finalize a missed miscarriage? Misoprostol to expel the remains of an embryo? It is not unreasonable to expect that your files will be subject to scrutiny if all abortion is banned.

Continued: https://drgabriellegoodrick.com/2018/07/30/an-open-letter-to-doctors-safe-abortion-is-in-your-hands-now-are-you-ready-to-step-up/

USA – I helped women get abortions for 28 years — through protests and shifting rules

I helped women get abortions for 28 years — through protests and shifting rules

By Joan Finn-McCracken
May 25, 2018
Joan Finn-McCracken is a former teacher and nurse practitioner. She was a director of Planned Parenthood clinics for 32 years.

One of the first patients who came to our family-planning clinic in Billings, Mont., newly opened in 1969, sought help after she and her boyfriend had hitchhiked 500 miles from Billings to Colorado to terminate a pregnancy. Colorado was one of the five states where abortions could be legally obtained. They had heard about Colorado through his older sister, and were able to borrow enough money for the procedure but not enough for a bus ticket. She was 17, unmarried and so desperate to return home before anyone missed her that she did not stay for her follow-up appointment. Now she came to us for follow-up care, as well as birth control.

Although I was the mother of five children and a graduate of the Duke University School of Nursing, and had taught in two nursing schools, I knew little about abortion. Our patient was afraid to go to her family doctor because she was not sure what was legal or illegal. And neither was I. But I did know we could not prescribe her birth control — it was against the law for anyone under 18.

Continued: https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/i-helped-women-get-abortions-for-28-years--through-protests-and-shifting-rules/2018/05/25/4f680826-5eb8-11e8-a4a4-c070ef53f315_story.html

Improving women’s health worldwide

Improving women’s health worldwide
Professor Lesley Regan
23rd April 2017

Sharing skills across borders is an important part of making a practical difference to improving women’s lives. I have always been a great supporter of global health programmes where young trainee doctors choose to spend a period of time in a host country to share their knowledge and skills and in turn benefit from the lessons gained from the people already working on the ground. It is definitely a two way learning process and our trainees gain hugely from the experience.

Continued at source: Hippocratic Post: https://www.hippocraticpost.com/events/improving-womens-health-worldwide/

23.04.2017