USA / Global – Second Trimester Taboo

Abortion pills are more important than ever, and safe far later than most people know

By Cecilia Nowell
Illustrations by Zhenya Oliinyk
Lux Magazine, June(?) issue

In a small Texas courtroom last spring, Erik Baptist, senior counsel for the conservative group Alliance Defending Freedom, insisted that the Food and Drug Administration had been reckless when it approved the abortion pill mifepristone for use before seven weeks of pregnancy in 2000, and then, in 2016, for up to 10 weeks.

The judge agreed, suspending the FDA’s approval of mifepristone, one of two pills used in the typical protocol for medication abortions in the U.S. The case made its way to the Supreme Court, which is expected to rule this summer on whether to uphold the suspension or otherwise restrict the use of mifepristone.

Continued: https://lux-magazine.com/article/second-trimester/

Nigeria – Economic hardship plunges married women into unsafe abortion, ignoring life-threatening risks

Low uptake of family planning services, aided by economic hardship, is taking its toll on some married couples who, burdened by unplanned pregnancies, now resort to unsafe abortions despite the associated risks.

30th June 2024
By Angela Onwuzoo

Mrs Bisi Lateef (not her real name) borrowed the sum of N15,000 from a friend to procure an abortion in February, and it took her one month to finally pay it back.

The woman, now in her early 40s, recalled what she experienced while ending her fifth pregnancy. According to her, she would have loved to keep it, but the resources to care for another baby were not available.

Continued: https://punchng.com/economic-hardship-plunges-married-women-into-unsafe-abortion-ignoring-life-threatening-risks/

Brazilian politicians want criminal penalties for abortion

June 30, 2024
By Cassiane Saraiva, Nicole Luna

Rio de Janeiro, BRAZIL – In recent weeks, conservative efforts to punish women who get abortions – including child victims of rape – as criminals has spurred demonstrations and discussion on social media. Unfortunately, abortion access is something that we, as a society, must fight to achieve.

Abortion in Brazil is allowed in cases when childbirth is a risk to life to the mother or in cases of rape or if the fetus has brain damage. The problem is that here in Brazil, the process to be able to receive the right to abort is extremely slow.

Continued: https://youthjournalism.org/brazilian-politicians-want-criminal-penalties-for-abortion/

30.06.2024

Nigeria – Voices unheard: Tales of stigma, suffering of women seeking abortion

June 28, 2024
by Adekunle Yusuf

Across Nigeria, abortion remains a taboo subject, cloaked in stigma and silence in both northern and southern regions. Beyond the veil lies a stark reality: women face profound emotional scars, societal stigma and life-threatening risks due to heavily regulated and often unsafe procedures. Associate Editor ADEKUNLE YUSUF delves into the harsh realities of women’s experiences, navigating Nigeria’s complex cultural, religious and legal landscape, highlighting the urgent need for reforms to ensure safe and accessible healthcare for all women.

Ada’s story begins in the bustling city of Lagos, where the vibrant energy of the metropolis belies her inner turmoil. At 24, Ada found herself pregnant and unprepared, caught in the throes of an unplanned pregnancy with her boyfriend, who quickly vanished upon hearing the news. “I felt like I was drowning,” Ada recalls, her voice a fragile whisper. “Everywhere I turned, there was judgment, and no one to turn to for help.”

Continued: https://thenationonlineng.net/voices-unheard-tales-of-stigma-suffering-of-women-seeking-abortion/

The supreme court abortion ruling hides conservative justices’ partisan agenda

One day soon, this case will come back, and the supreme court will allow states to ban emergency abortions

Moira Donegan
Fri 28 Jun 2024

The supreme court is a messy institution. Its six conservative justices are mired in infighting over both the pace of their shared ideological project of remaking American law and life according to rightwing preferences, and over their preferred methodological course for doing so. Their squabbling is not helped by the fact that two of them, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, keep embarrassing the court with gauche public scandals, which draw attention to the court’s legitimacy crises like a vulgar flag waving above One First Street. For their part, the liberals are exhausted, impotent and at times apparently publicly despairing. Their dissents have sometimes taken on tones of exasperation and peeved sarcasm, as if they’re turning to the country and asking: “Can you believe this?” Their most senior member, Sonia Sotomayor, recently told an interviewer that over the past several terms, since the court’s conservative supermajority was sealed under the Trump administration, she has sometimes gone into her chambers after the announcement of major decisions and wept. She says she anticipates having to do so again: in one recent dissent, she warned ominously about the future of gay marriage rights.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/article/2024/jun/28/supreme-court-abortion-ruling-conservative-justices

28.06.2024

Opinion

Burwell v Hobby Lobby

Clarence Thomas

emergency abortions

EMTALA

Justice Sonia Sotomayor

Moira Donegan

Moyle v United States

Supreme Court decision allows pregnant people in Idaho to access emergency abortion care — for now

By Jen Christensen, CNN
Thu June 27, 2024

Pregnant people in Idaho should be able to access abortion in a medical emergency in Idaho, at least for now.

The Supreme Court formally dismissed an appeal over Idaho’s strict abortion ban on Thursday, blocking enforcement of the state’s law where it conflicts with federal law. With Thursday’s decision, the state would not be allowed to deny an emergency abortion to a pregnant person whose health is in danger, at least while the case makes its way through the courts.

Continued: https://www.cnn.com/2024/06/26/health/emtala-emergency-care-scotus/index.html

Mexico’s abortion activists pivot to help Americans as they struggle with the post-Roe reality

Mexicans once envied the reproductive freedoms available in the United States. Now, they’re shipping pills across the border and fielding desperate questions from states where abortion is effectively banned

JANICE DICKSON, INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS REPORTER
PHOTOGRAPHY BY VERÓNICA GABRIELA CÁRDENAS
June 26, 2024

Vanessa Jiménez Rubalcava could spend all day responding to text messages. They come in at all hours, a torrent of questions from Americans translated into Spanish. The women and girls on the other end are all looking for the same thing: abortion pills.

On a quiet street in Monterrey, a sprawling city in northern Mexico, getting help from Ms. Jiménez Rubalcava and her wife, Sandra Cardona Alanís, is the only option for many women living north of the border who are desperate to terminate unwanted pregnancies.

Continued: https://www.theglobeandmail.com/world/us-politics/article-mexicos-abortion-activists-pivot-to-help-americans-as-they-struggle/

Poland’s Parliamentary Commission Recommends Decriminalization of Abortion

Center for Reproductive Rights
June 25, 2024

GENEVA – The Center for Reproductive Rights welcomes today’s landmark recommendation by a Polish parliamentary commission in favour of the decriminalization of abortion in Poland. This recommendation signals an important first step in efforts to align Poland’s abortion laws with European and international norms and ensure the health and rights of women and girls are protected.

The commission has advised the Polish parliament to fully decriminalize abortion within the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, and later in specific situations. The Polish parliament is expected to consider this proposal from the commission, alongside other recommendations on abortion law reform, later this year.

Continued: https://reproductiverights.org/poland-parliamentary-commission-recommends-abortion-decriminalization/

25.06.2024

News

abortion law reform

Center for Reproductive Rights

Will SCOTUS Allow Pregnant Women to Die?

6/24/2024
by CARRIE N. BAKER, Ms. Magazine

A decision from the U.S. Supreme Court will be coming any day now in two cases, Idaho v. United States and Moyle v. United States, about whether states can prohibit doctors from treating women with life-threatening pregnancies until a patient’s condition deteriorates to the point where they are about to die.

The National Women’s Law Center (NWLC) filed an amicus brief in these cases describing several of the more than 70 documented cases of women almost dying—and at least one who did die—when they were denied emergency medical care because of abortion bans enacted across the country after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June 2022. And “the true number of cases is likely significantly higher,” according the NWLC brief.

Continued: https://msmagazine.com/2024/06/24/emtala-supreme-court-women-die-abortion-bans-pregnant/

Two years after Roe’s overturn, there are more abortions in America — but they’re harder to get

Abortion has become more diffuse, thanks to the rise of telehealth and abortion pills. Both are under fire in the courts and state legislatures.

Shefali Luthra, Health Reporter
June 24, 2024

Two years after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, the number of abortions performed in the country is up. But that’s only part of the story. In many places, they are also much harder to get or provide.

Clinicians nationwide provided more than a million abortions in 2023 – the highest in the country’s recorded history — in the first full year since Roe’s fall, according to the nonpartisan Guttmacher Institute. That’s the result of a dramatic change in how people get abortions: Rather than receiving clinic-based care in their home states, people are increasingly traveling across state lines, or going online to obtain drug prescriptions. Almost 200,000 people traveled to another state for an abortion. Data from the Society of Family Planning suggests that 1 in 5 are now done through telemedicine, in which a health care professional prescribes and mails abortion pills for a patient to take at home.

Continued: https://19thnews.org/2024/06/two-years-roe-overturn-abortions/