Act on the Evidence: Policy Solutions to Protect and Advance Abortion and Contraception Access in the United States

Kelly Baden, Candace Gibson, Amy Friedrich-Karnik, Guttmacher Institute
November 2025

As the United States contends with the consequences of the Dobbs decision and an emboldened opposition seeking to further dismantle sexual and reproductive rights and access, both providers and people seeking care face unprecedented threats. A growing, global anti-rights and anti-science climate buttressed by the spread of mis- and disinformation, is driving continued attempts to eliminate abortion access. Communities already harmed by unjust systems and policies are experiencing disproportionate impacts.

Rooted in the belief that sound policy starts with high-quality evidence, Guttmacher’s flagship research on abortion and contraception underscores the growing barriers to reproductive health care while pointing to policy solutions that can move us closer to reproductive health care access for all. This analysis draws on findings from leading Guttmacher research projects to identify recent trends in abortion and contraceptive access and offers policy recommendations informed by that evidence.

Continued: https://www.guttmacher.org/2025/11/act-evidence-policy-solutions-protect-and-advance-abortion-and-contraception-access-united

11.11.2025

right to travel for abortion

USA – New Federal Medicaid Cuts Will Devastate Coverage for Reproductive Health Care

Adam Sonfield, Sonfield Policy Solutions LLC, Amy Friedrich-Karnik, Guttmacher Institute
Nov 10, 2025

For decades, Medicaid has been central to contraceptive care and other reproductive health services for low-income people in the United States. Massive cuts to Medicaid under the recent federal budget law are poised to strip away coverage and access to care from millions of people, with far-reaching and harmful consequences nationwide.

Medicaid is the second largest source of health insurance in the United States, and it covers 21% of women aged 15–49,* the group most likely to need and use reproductive health care. The program’s role has increased substantially over the past decade after 40 states and the District of Columbia expanded Medicaid for adults with incomes up to 138% of the federal poverty level, as allowed by the Affordable Care Act (ACA).

Continued: https://www.guttmacher.org/2025/11/new-federal-medicaid-cuts-will-devastate-coverage-reproductive-health-care

10.11.2025

USA – RFK Jr. Is Coming for Abortion Pills

And he’s relying on bogus science to make his case.

Julianne McShane, Mother Jones
May 15, 2025

Earlier this month, the Trump administration scored seemingly positive headlines when it asked a federal court to dismiss a case brought by three Republican states seeking to restrict telehealth access to mifepristone, the first of two drugs used in a medication abortion.

Several news outlets claimed in headlines that the administration would “defend” access to the pills, despite the fact that Project 2025 and several of Trump’s top appointees have made it clear that they believe access to mifepristone—which, along with the second drug, misoprostol, now account for more than 60 percent of all abortions that occur nationwide—should be drastically rolled back, as I have previously reported. In reality, the administration merely argued the states do not have standing to sue and did not weigh in on the underlying issue of access to the pills.

Continued: https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2025/05/rfk-jr-is-coming-for-abortion-pills/

Guttmacher Releases First-Ever State-Level Data on Medication Abortion Provision

Data show medication abortion remains critical as federal attacks on access intensify

Feb 27, 2025

The Guttmacher Institute released the latest round of data from its Monthly Abortion Provision Study, an initiative launched in 2023 to produce monthly estimates of clinician-provided abortions in US states without total abortion bans. In addition to state and national abortion estimates from January 2023 through November 2024, for the first time the data also include state-level estimates of the proportion of abortions provided via medication in 2023 in states without total abortion bans and the proportion of all abortions that were provided by online-only clinics in 2023 in states without total bans or bans on telemedicine provision. In an accompanying policy analysis, Guttmacher experts put these findings in the larger political context, outlining the current and future threats to medication abortion in the United States.

The new data confirm that medication abortion accounts for the majority of abortions provided in nearly all US states without total abortion bans, ranging from 95% in Wyoming and 84% in Montana to 44% in Washington, DC and 46% in Ohio. These estimates expand on Guttmacher’s previous finding that 63% of all clinician-provided abortions in 2023 in the United States (excluding states with total abortion bans) were medication abortions.

Continued: https://www.guttmacher.org/news-release/2025/guttmacher-releases-first-ever-state-level-data-medication-abortion-provision

27.02.2025

SCOTUS Just Gave Abortion Clinics a Rare Win

But more significant threats from Trump’s Department of Justice remain.

Feb 24, 2025
Julianne McShane, Mother Jones

On Monday, the Supreme Court handed abortion rights advocates a rare win when they declined to take up a pair of cases seeking to challenge a decades-old decision limiting protesters’ actions near the entrances of abortion clinics. But, experts say that even though this result is positive, the decision’s reach is limited and does nothing to roll back the near impunity the Trump administration has extended to anti-abortion protesters who target abortion clinics.

Anti-abortion activists who brought the cases sought to overrule Hill v. Colorado, a 2000 decision in which a majority of the justices upheld a Colorado law requiring that abortion protesters obtain consent before coming within eight feet of another person to speak to them or distribute leaflets within 100 feet of the entrance of a health care clinic, including abortion clinics.

Continued: https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2025/02/scotus-just-gave-abortion-clinics-a-rare-win/

How a Trump win could hurt abortion access around the world

Countries from Ethiopia to Nepal felt the pinch on reproductive health during Trump's first term. What would a second bring?

David Sherfinski
May 30, 2024

RICHMOND, Virginia - This year's election between President Joe Biden and his Republican opponent Donald Trump threatens to upend abortion access and reproductive health services far beyond the United States.

Anti-abortion advocates are already drawing up plans for Trump to reinstate and expand funding restrictions on overseas groups that critics say disrupted reproductive health services like access to contraception in countries from Kenya to Nepal during the former president's four-year term.

Continued: https://www.context.news/money-power-people/how-a-trump-win-could-hurt-abortion-access-around-the-world

USA: It Always Comes Down to Abortion

It Always Comes Down to Abortion

Katie McDonough
Jan 5, 2017

In the final months of 2017, the Trump administration tried and failed to block three undocumented teenagers from getting abortions while in the custody of the Office of Refugee Resettlement. In each case, the young women sought access to the procedure only to be refused by the agency, which cited a policy issued in March barring “any action that facilitates” abortion for unaccompanied minors, including “scheduling appointments, transportation, or other arrangements,” unless approved by agency director Scott Lloyd.

That approval would likely never come, even in cases of rape, because, according to a letter from Lloyd, to allow minors in ORR custody to terminate their pregnancies would be the equivalent of “being asked to participate in killing a human being in our care.”

Continued at source: https://splinternews.com/it-always-comes-down-to-abortion-1821812298

USA: The House just passed a 20-week abortion ban. Opponents say it’s “basically relying on junk science.”

The House just passed a 20-week abortion ban. Opponents say it's “basically relying on junk science.”
The bill is based on claims about fetal pain that aren’t supported by research.
Updated by Anna North Oct 3, 2017

The House voted on Tuesday to pass a bill that would make abortion after 20 weeks illegal in every state in the country. Called the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, it’s based on the idea that a fetus at 20 weeks’ gestation can feel pain.

“The Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act will protect the voiceless, the vulnerable, and the marginalized," said Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), the House majority leader, in a statement last month. "It will protect those children who science has proven can feel pain.” President Donald Trump has promised to sign the bill if it passes; during the campaign, he said such a bill “would end painful late-term abortions nationwide.”

Continued at source: https://www.vox.com/identities/2017/10/3/16401826/abortion-ban-pain-capable-unborn-child-protection-act

03.10.2017