Why President Biden Should Increase Access to the Abortion Pill

BY MOIRA TAN
JANUARY 20, 2021

In this op-ed, Moira Tan, a 23-year-old Washington, D.C.-based reproductive justice organizer and legal scholar, explains how access to the abortion pill can help young people. She is a member of the Young Womxn of Color 4 Reproductive Justice Leadership Council and a volunteer with Collective Action for Safe Spaces DC.

Nearly 50 years after the Supreme Court decided Roe v. Wade (1973), challenges to abortion continue to deluge the political landscape. From Louisiana to Kentucky to Colorado and Oregon, none of us young people organizing for abortion access in our communities are left unscathed by the relentless attacks on the constitutionally-affirmed procedure. There are unnecessary waiting periods, the proliferation of deceitful clinics, age restrictions, and more, with hundreds of bills and regulations introduced every year at the state and federal levels.

Continued: https://www.teenvogue.com/story/president-biden-abortion-pill

Let’s Do The Right Thing Now About Abortion

Jaevion Nelson
Published: Wednesday | January 20, 2021

The men of the cloth and their surrogates, including those in the Love March Movement (who betray everything their name suggests), have awkwardly awakened from their deep slumber.

It’s funny when you think how easily topics like buggery, gambling and abortion jolt them into ‘action’.

Continued: http://jamaica-gleaner.com/article/commentary/20210120/jaevion-nelson-lets-do-right-thing-now-about-abortion

20.01.2021

Jamaica Offences Against the Person Act

Juliet Cuthbert-Flynn

Finally, New Brunswick is being sued for unlawful restrictions on abortion access

by Martha Paynter
Jan 18, 2021

On January 7, the Canadian Civil Liberties Association filed a lawsuit against the Higgs government in New Brunswick, challenging the constitutionality of the province’s restrictions to publicly-insured abortion services. Section 2.a.1 of Regulation 84-20 of the N.B. Medical Services Payment Act, enacted in 1984, states that abortion is “deemed not to be entitled services” for provincial payment unless it is provided in an approved hospital facility. Other services similarly banned from public payment include cosmetic surgery and breast augmentation. The regulation effectively excludes abortion care provided by Clinic 554, the former Morgentaler Clinic in Fredericton, from public coverage. The federal government has reprimanded New Brunswick for being the only province in the country that refuses to fund clinic-based abortion, a move that violates the Canada Health Act.

As a registered nurse working in abortion care and research, I recognize there are many potential advantages to going to a clinic for abortion care, such as a welcoming environment; more specialized staff; and reduced travel time, since many clinics also provide related services like ultrasounds and bloodwork collection. But in New Brunswick there are two additional, critical benefits.

Continued: https://briarpatchmagazine.com/articles/view/finally-new-brunswick-is-being-sued-for-unlawful-restrictions-on-abortion-access

A Voice for Choice : It’s Time for Women to Reclaim the Narrative Around Later Abortions

By Mary Angeles Armstrong
January 1, 2021

It was hard—and it was something I just knew right away," remembers Jenn Chalifoux. She was 18 and on leave from college, at home in Long Island to receive treatment for anorexia, when she realized she was pregnant. Since a common side effect of anorexia is amenorrhea (a cessation of the menstrual cycle), missed periods didn't sound the alarm bell. She was surrounded by doctors, having blood work frequently, and on birth control. "It didn't even occur to me that I might [be pregnant]," she recalls. "My medical team thought my menstrual cycle would return as I progressed in my recovery." When it didn't, months into her treatment, Chalifoux took a pregnancy test at a friend's house. It came back positive and a follow-up appointment with her doctor revealed that she was well into her second trimester. It was a shock.

Continued: https://www.chronogram.com/hudsonvalley/a-voice-for-choice/Content?oid=12035816

01.01.2021

Featured

Opinion

Advancing New Standards in Reproductive Health

Mary Angeles Armstrong

What Argentina’s ‘green handkerchief’ movement is all about

OPINION BY JILL FILIPOVIC
Dec 29, 2020

As 2020 comes to a close, there's a bright spot at the tail end of a long, dark year: Argentina just made women's rights history.

On Wednesday, a majority of its Senate voted yes on a bill to legalize abortion up to 14 weeks into a pregnancy -- a significant liberalization of the current law, which generally prohibits the procedure, and only allows exceptions for rape and the pregnant woman's health. President Alberto Fernández has pledged to sign the bill into law, which will make Argentina the largest nation in Latin America to legalize abortion, and one of just a tiny handful of countries in the region where women are allowed to decide for themselves whether or not to continue a pregnancy.

Continued: https://www.kctv5.com/what-argentinas-green-handkerchief-movement-is-all-about/article_0cdb4f0a-c868-563b-9113-bcecd21dc8d7.html

Argentina must legalize abortion so doctors like me don’t have to choose between helping or going to prison

Opinion by Cecilia Ousset
Dec. 28, 2020

I am a Catholic doctor, mother of four and a
conscientious objector to abortion who has been trying to reconcile her
religious views with public health needs. Because the reality that I see every
day is that all women have abortions. The married woman and the single one, the
Catholic, the Jewish, the atheist. Women who do not use birth control and those
whose birth control has failed them. Illiterate women and those with college
degrees.

The difference, however, is in the conditions under which they have abortions.
That’s always defined by their economic status.

Continued: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/12/28/argentina-legal-abortion-senate-vote/

Canada – Why Are We Still Talking About Abortion?

Abortion is one of the most polarizing topics at play around the world.

By Melissa Parker
December 23, 2020

Politicians, lawmakers, scientists, the healthcare industry and women in particular, and humanity as a whole, have a stake in the legalities surrounding abortion and the right to choose them. Here in Canada, abortion is legal, safe and covered through our health care infrastructure – though, difficult to find in some rural communities. Current legislation allows Canadian women have the right to access abortion procedures up to 24 weeks of pregnancy with medical emergency abortions available after that window. These late-term abortions, while legal, are rare and based on necessity but may require travel to another province or the USA.

In Canadian politics, Erin O’Toole, the new Conservative leader, has publicly
announced that he would not allow his party to open the discussion on abortion
law in our country. This is a far cry
from the previous leader, Andrew Scheer who slyly skirted the conversation
indicating that “he” wouldn’t reopen the discussion but his MPPs were free
to. Under Scheer, more than 40
conservative leaders across the country openly shared their agendas to make
abortion illegal again, including MPP Sam Oosterhoff – it will be interesting
to see how open they will be under new leadership and too early to say when the
topic will arise again.

Continued: https://londonfuse.ca/opinion-why-are-we-still-talking-about-abortion/

USA – Telemedicine abortion is here to stay

By Carrie N. Baker

Published: 12/23/2020

The COVID-19 pandemic is transforming many aspects of our lives, and
abortion is no exception. Telemedicine is expanding access to abortion health
care in ways that are likely to persist long after the pandemic is over.

Telemedicine abortion combines medication abortion — which uses pills to end a
pregnancy — and telemedicine — which allows health providers to supervise the
use of abortion pills via videoconferencing or telephone consultations.

Continued: https://www.gazettenet.com/Baker-column-37937013

Scotland – Abortion rules revolutionised by Covid-19 must stay

Jillian Merchant
Monday December 21 2020

At the start of the pandemic the Scottish government, at the urging of medical practitioners and activists, issued guidance allowing early medical abortion at home to prevent unnecessary risk to women and clinicians.

This enabled women in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy to attend medical appointments by telephone or video call before, where clinically appropriate, being sent the two abortion pills to take at home. This is now subject to a public consultation on making the change permanent.

Continued: https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/abortion-rules-revolutionised-by-covid-19-must-stay-t0x6fgnkc

21.12.2020

Featured

Opinion

abortion at home

Abortion Rights Coalition

home use of abortion pill

mifepristone

telemedicine abortion

Contemporary abortion restrictions and cautionary tales from history

Carla Ramazan
Dec 18, 2020
Reno Gazette Journal

Nearly 20 years ago, my aunt died obtaining an unsafe abortion in our home country, Romania, because federal laws made it impossible to safely terminate a pregnancy. Today, the United States is bordering on a reality where abortion is inaccessible, if not illegal, especially in Republican-controlled states such as Arkansas. This year, a federal court ruled that a variety of first-of-their-kind abortion regulations can be implemented in Arkansas. This decision will push those who seek abortion-care into dark situations.

Beginning this August, doctors in Arkansas
are prohibited from performing dilation and evacuation abortions on patients,
and consequences for not complying include up to six years in prison. Doctors
will also be required to notify local law enforcement when patients under the
age of 17 seek an abortion and will be forced to involve family members of the
patient in deciding how to dispose of fetal tissue remains.

Continued: https://www.rgj.com/story/opinion/voices/2020/12/19/contemporary-abortion-restrictions-and-cautionary-tales-history-ramazan/3953803001/