As Missouri Clinic Awaits Its Legal Fate, Abortions In State Have Virtually Halted

As Missouri Clinic Awaits Its Legal Fate, Abortions In State Have Virtually Halted

March 12, 2020
Sarah McCammon

Missouri could soon become the first state in the nation without a clinic providing abortions, but Planned Parenthood officials say the last remaining one there has already all-but ceased performing the procedure.

The clinic, Reproductive Health Services of Planned Parenthood of the St. Louis Region, is at the center of a licensing dispute between the organization and Missouri Republican Gov. Mike Parson's administration. That clinic's future is in the hands of a state commission that is expected to issue a decision in the coming weeks or months.

Continued: https://www.npr.org/2020/03/12/814768754/as-missouri-clinic-awaits-its-legal-fate-abortions-in-state-have-virtually-halte


USA – “Failed” abortions, a period-tracking spreadsheet, and the last clinic standing: the controversy in Missouri, explained

“Failed” abortions, a period-tracking spreadsheet, and the last clinic standing: the controversy in Missouri, explained
Hearings will determine if Missouri will be the first state without an abortion clinic.

By Anna North
Oct 31, 2019

At a hearing over an investigation of Missouri’s lone abortion clinic, a state official testified to something that has disturbed reproductive health advocates in the state and beyond: With the help of state medical records, his office had created a spreadsheet tracking patients’ menstrual periods.

The goal, according to the Kansas City Star, was to investigate “failed” abortions, instances in which the patient needed to return a second time to complete the procedure. The idea was apparently that, by gathering data on patients’ periods, state officials would know who was still pregnant after a scheduled abortion.

Continued: https://www.vox.com/2019/10/31/20939890/missouri-abortion-clinic-hearing-periods-roe-wade


Missouri and the Fight for Abortion Rights: How Past Became Prologue

Missouri and the Fight for Abortion Rights: How Past Became Prologue
Missouri’s historic battle for abortion rights presaged in important ways where we are today, and what will be required of reproductive rights advocates in the future.

Aug 1, 2019
Angela Bonavoglia

The time, the late 1960s; the place, St. Louis, Missouri. Judy Widdicombe, a twenty-something self-described supermom, was raising two boys with her husband, working as a labor and delivery nurse in a Catholic hospital, and volunteering one night a week as a counselor on a suicide prevention hotline.

“In those days, there was no official place a woman with an unwanted pregnancy could go for help,” she told me when I interviewed her for my book, The Choices We Made: 25 Women and Men Speak Out About Abortion.

Continued: https://rewire.news/article/2019/08/01/missouri-and-the-fight-for-abortion-rights-how-past-became-prologue/