These Hawaii Doctors Are Fighting Guam’s Abortion Law

Abortions are legal in Guam, but women have no access to them because of a lack of local providers and rules requiring in-person consultations for the procedures.

By Eleni Avendaño
May 9, 2021

Women in Guam who want an abortion are being forced to come to Hawaii or travel elsewhere for the procedure since the island’s only abortion provider left a few years ago.

But two Hawaii physicians and the American Civil Liberties Union are trying to convince a Guam court that women in the U.S. territory should be able to get abortions using medication prescribed remotely instead of having to travel for an in-person appointment. A Guam judge denied a preliminary injunction last week and the case is now pending in District Court.

Continued: https://www.civilbeat.org/2021/05/these-hawaii-doctors-are-fighting-guams-abortion-law/

09.05.2021

Alexa Kolbi-Molinas

American Civil Liberties Union

American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists

Dr. Reni Soon

Guam abortion law

Gynuity Health Projects

Heather Kennedy

Reproductive Freedom Project

telemedicine abortion

Getting an abortion on Guam requires a $1,000, eight-hour flight. A lawsuit could change that

The ACLU is suing the US territory over restrictive laws that block people from accessing telemedicine medication abortions

Michelle Broder Van Dyke in Honolulu
Mon 22 Feb 2021

Getting an abortion on Guam, a remote US territory in the Pacific Ocean, has never been simple. Before 2016 there were only two abortion doctors on the entire island, and anti-abortion protesters would often stand outside their clinics with signs.

But since 2018, it has been impossible. That year Guam lost its last abortion provider when Dr William Freeman retired and moved away, and the doctor who took over refused to conduct them. This means that the closest US abortion clinic is now in Hawaiʻi, an eight-hour and $1,000 flight away. The number of abortions on Guam dropped from more than 200 a year in 2017 to zero.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/feb/22/guam-abortions-aclu-lawsuit

Janet Benshoof: Human rights lawyer who campaigned for abortion rights in the US and across the world

Janet Benshoof: Human rights lawyer who campaigned for abortion rights in the US and across the world
She proved a formidable foe to anti-abortion activists, never cowing to threats of violence, and her vision for empowering girls and women was steadfastly internationalist in scope

Harrison Smith
Thursday 4 January 2018

Janet Benshoof was an American human rights lawyer who campaigned to expand access to contraceptives and abortions across the world. She led organisations that advocated on behalf of women from the US to Burma and Iraq.

In the American territory of Guam, she was once arrested for protesting against her country’s most restrictive abortion law.

Continued at source: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/janet-benshoof-abortion-rights-us-human-rights-lawyer-america-world-pro-life-choice-anti-death-a8141321.html

04.01.2018