Yes, science can weigh in on abortion law

Why, as a scientist, I signed an amicus brief for the US Supreme Court’s case on abortion.

Diana Greene Foster, Nature
16 November 2021

The world is moving towards greater reproductive rights for women. More than 50 countries have liberalized their abortion laws in the past 25 years, informed by scientific research. Studies find that unsafe abortion is responsible for one in eight maternal deaths globally (E. Ahman and I. H. Shah Int. J. Gynaecol. Obstet. 115, 121–126; 2011), concentrated in low-income countries where abortion is illegal. Preventing unsafe abortion is a priority — 193 countries signed up to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, which call for reductions in maternal mortality.

Yet some countries, such as the United States, Poland and Nicaragua, are making access to abortion more difficult. Restrictions are passed on the basis of ideology or political motives, without considering scientific evidence about their impact.

Continued: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-03434-1

16.11.2021

Opinion

consequences of being denied abortion

Diana Greene Foster

intimate partner violence

The Study That Debunks Most Anti-Abortion Arguments

For five years, a team of researchers asked women about their experience after having—or not having—an abortion. What do their answers tell us?

By Margaret Talbot
July 7, 2020

There is a kind of social experiment you might think of as a What if? study. It would start with people who are similar in certain basic demographic ways and who are standing at the same significant fork in the road. Researchers could not assign participants to take one path or another—that would be wildly unethical. But let’s say that some more or less arbitrary rule in the world did the assigning for them. In such circumstances, researchers could follow the resulting two groups of people over time, sliding-doors style, to see how their lives panned out differently. It would be like speculative fiction, only true, and with statistical significance.

A remarkable piece of research called the Turnaway Study, which began in 2007, is essentially that sort of experiment.

Continued: https://www.newyorker.com/books/under-review/the-study-that-debunks-most-anti-abortion-arguments

Why being denied an abortion can lead to ‘financial turmoil’

Why being denied an abortion can lead to 'financial turmoil'
Women who are unable to obtain abortions are more likely to face debt, bankruptcy and eviction

Danielle Renwick
Sat 20 Jun 2020

Kayla Moye was beginning a 90-day sentence in a Cleveland jail when she learned she was pregnant. She was 19, and she wanted an abortion.

She visited a nurse inside the facility to ask about her options. “Her exact words were ‘that wouldn’t be an option’ for me,” Moye said. “I later found out that [saying] that was totally illegal.” By the time she was released, she was in her second trimester, and decided to carry her pregnancy to term. Her son was born prematurely two months later.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jun/20/abortion-denied-debt-bankruptcy-eviction

20.06.2020

Featured

News

abortion denied

consequences of being denied abortion

Kayla Moye

National Bureau of Economic Research

USA – Study Examines The Lasting Effects Of Having — Or Being Denied — An Abortion

Study Examines The Lasting Effects Of Having — Or Being Denied — An Abortion
In The Turnaway Study, Diana Greene Foster shares research conducted over 10 years with about 1,000 women who had or were denied abortions, tracking impacts on mental, physical and economic health.

June 16, 2020
Terry Gross
Fresh Air - 36-Minute Listen

TERRY GROSS, HOST:

This is FRESH AIR. I'm Terry Gross. When Mike Pence was running for vice president, he said, if we appoint strict constructionists to the Supreme Court, as Donald Trump intends to do, I believe we will see Roe v. Wade consigned to the ash heap of history where it belongs. Since then, Trump has appointed two conservative justices. The arguments used against abortion often refer to the medical risks of the procedure and the guilt and loss of self-esteem suffered by women who have abortions.

In order to explore what the impact of abortion is on women's health and women's lives, my guest, Diana Greene Foster, became the principal investigator of a 10-year study comparing women who had abortions at the end of the deadline allowed by the clinic and those who just missed the deadline and were turned away. The study focuses on the emotional health and socioeconomic outcomes for women who received a wanted abortion and those who were denied one.

Continued: https://www.npr.org/2020/06/16/877846258/study-examines-the-lasting-effects-of-having-or-being-denied-an-abortion