HHS eliminates CDC staff who made sure birth control is safe for women at risk

By Rachana Pradhan
June 30, 2025

For Brianna Henderson, birth control isn't just about preventing pregnancy. The Texas mother of two was diagnosed with a rare and potentially fatal heart condition after having her second child. In addition to avoiding another pregnancy that could be life-threatening, Henderson has to make sure the contraception she uses doesn't jeopardize her health.

For more than a decade, a small team of people at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention worked to do just that, issuing national guidelines for clinicians on how to prescribe contraception safely for millions of women with underlying medical conditions — including heart disease, lupus, sickle cell disease, and obesity. But the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees the CDC, fired those workers as part of the Trump administration's rapid downsizing of the federal workforce.

Continued; https://www.cbsnews.com/news/hhs-cdc-staff-birth-control-safety-women-at-risk/

Anti-abortion centers raked in $1.4bn in year Roe fell, including federal money

Exclusive: memo shows anti-abortion pregnancy centers received at least $344m in government money in 2022

Carter Sherman
Wed 14 Feb 2024

Anti-abortion facilities raked in at least $1.4bn in revenue in the 2022 fiscal year, the year Roe v Wade fell – a staggering haul that includes at least $344m in government money, according to a memo analyzing the centers’ tax documents that was compiled by a pro-abortion rights group and shared exclusively with the Guardian.

These facilities, frequently known as anti-abortion pregnancy centers or crisis pregnancy centers, aim to convince people to keep their pregnancies. But in the aftermath of Roe’s demise, the anti-abortion movement has framed anti-abortion pregnancy centers as a key source of aid for desperate women who have lost the legal right to end their pregnancies and been left with little choice but to give birth.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/feb/14/anti-abortion-centers-funding

What to Know About the Federal Law at the Heart of the Latest Supreme Court Abortion Case

The federal Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, known as EMTALA, requires hospitals to provide medically necessary care to stabilize patients in emergency situations.

By Pam Belluck
Jan. 18, 2024

One of the newest battlefields in the abortion debate is a decades-old federal law called the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, known by doctors and health policymakers as EMTALA.

The issue involves whether the law requires hospital emergency rooms to provide abortions in urgent circumstances, including when a woman’s health is threatened by continuing her pregnancy. But, as with many abortion-related arguments, this one could have broader implications. Some legal experts say it could potentially determine how restrictive state abortion laws are allowed to be and whether states can prevent emergency rooms from providing other types of medical care, such as gender-affirming treatments.

Continued: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/18/health/emtala-abortion-supreme-court.html

USA – The Future of Abortion Pills Is on the Line

FEB. 3, 2023
By Andrea González-Ramírez

Since the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision, abortion pills have been a powerful tool for people to safely end a pregnancy on their own at home in the 14 states that have banned abortion. Abortion opponents and supporters are deeply invested in either cutting off or expanding access to the pills, and that tension has triggered a wave of legal challenges that could determine the future of medication abortion in the U.S.

“Back in the pre-Roe era, abortion was all done via procedure, which meant that if you could control the gatekeepers — the providers — then you could stop abortion in your state or stop a lot of it,” says Greer Donley, an associate professor at the University of Pittsburgh School of Law. “But now pills travel across borders all the time. It makes abortion really hard to control.”

Continued: https://www.thecut.com/2023/02/whats-happening-with-abortion-pills-in-the-courts.html

U.S. proposes new rule to strengthen birth control access through Obamacare

Rule could help expand coverage for 'tens of millions of women across the country'

Thomson Reuters
Jan 30, 2023

The U.S. government on Monday proposed a new rule allowing women enrolled in Obamacare plans to get access to birth control even if their employer, school or health plan objects on religious grounds.

The rule could help expand coverage for "tens of millions of women across the country" who have access to birth control coverage under the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) said.

Continued: https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/us-obamacare-birth-control-1.6730895

30.01.2023

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‘At death’s door’: abortion bans endanger lives of high-risk patients, Texas study shows

In a preview of what’s to come in half the country, a near-total ban has led some providers to deny care until mothers’ health deteriorated

Mary Tuma
Wed 13 Jul 2022

Facing a rupture of membranes before fetal viability – a condition in which water breaks too early – a pregnant patient in Texas desperately needed an abortion. She risked infection, sepsis, excessive bleeding and even death.

But her healthcare provider’s hands were tied by Senate Bill 8, a near-total ban in effect since September 2021, preventing her from accessing that potentially life-saving care in her home state. Despite the risk associated with air travel, she boarded a plane to obtain the procedure out of state. Her obstetrician cautioned that she could go into labor in-flight and give birth to a stillborn 19-week fetus. “If you labor on the plane, leave the placenta inside of you,” the doctor warned.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jul/13/texas-abortion-ban-maternal-health-risk

Appeals court rules in Biden’s favor on abortion referrals

A court has allowed federally funded family planning clinics to continue to make abortion referrals for now

By JULIE CARR SMYTH, Associated Press
8 February 2022

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Federally funded family planning clinics can continue to make abortion referrals for now, a federal court ruled Tuesday, in a setback for a dozen Republican attorneys general who have sued to restore a Trump-era ban on the practice.

The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati denied a request by the 12 states to pause rules for the federal government’s family planning program while their case is heard. The states were eager to stop implementation before the next round of federal grants starts rolling out in March.

Continued: https://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory/appeals-court-rules-bidens-favor-abortion-referrals-82756194

08.02.2022

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Biden lifts abortion referral ban on family planning clinics

Posted Monday, October 4, 2021
By RICARDO ALONSO-ZALDIVAR, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Biden administration on Monday reversed a ban on abortion referrals by family planning clinics, lifting a Trump-era restriction as political and legal battles over abortion grow sharper from Texas to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The Department of Health and Human Services said its new regulation will restore the federal family planning program to the way it ran under the Obama administration, when clinics were able to refer women seeking abortions to a provider.

Continued: https://www.kentuckytoday.com/stories/biden-lifts-abortion-referral-ban-on-family-planning-clinics,34521

04.10.2021

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US – The Supreme Court considers an important showdown over abortion this week

The Court has been surprisingly hesitant to weigh in on abortion. But a pending case is likely to force its hand.

By Ian Millhiser
May 11, 2021

The Supreme Court has been sitting on a potentially very significant abortion case for the last two months, one that the Court’s rules say it should dismiss. We’re likely to find out this week whether the Court will dismiss this case, however, and that decision could tell us a great deal about how fast the Court plans to move in rolling back abortion rights.

In February, about a month after President Joe Biden took office, the Supreme Court announced that it would hear three consolidated cases challenging a Trump administration policy targeting abortion clinics.

Continued: https://www.vox.com/22428611/supreme-court-abortion-gag-rule-title-x-american-medical-association-becerra-biden-trump

Will the Biden Administration Get Bolder on Improving Abortion Access?

The FDA’s announcement that it will permit abortion medication to be sent by mail is a start—but advocates are hoping for more.

By Amy Littlefield
Apr 27, 2021

The Biden administration’s announcement this month that it would allow mifepristone to be sent by mail revolutionized access to abortion—in about half the country. Elsewhere, state laws requiring patients to meet with a provider in person preempt the new policy, underscoring just how much a person’s options depend on where they live.

“I think it’s great for states that it will impact,” Laurie Bertram Roberts, who cofounded the Mississippi Reproductive Freedom Fund and now leads the Yellowhammer Fund in Alabama, said with a wry laugh. “Neither of the states that I work in are one of those.”

Continued: https://www.thenation.com/article/society/fda-abortion-biden/

27.04.2021