Western ‘family values’ rhetoric undermines ubuntu and reproductive justice for all in Africa

After commemorating International Human Rights Day on 10 December, a look at how Western-influenced right-wing movements are gaining traction in Africa and are using so-called traditional family values to undermine sexual and reproductive health rights and LGBTQIA+ rights.

By Sesona Buyeye and Duduetsang Mmeti
16 Dec 2025

Across the world, right-wing movements – often cloaked in the language of “moral and religious preservation” and “anti-wokeness” – are pushing back against progressive human rights advancing reproductive freedoms for women, girls and queer people.

Alarmingly, these movements are also gaining traction across parts of Africa, where significant strides have been made in embracing democracy, advancing constitutionalism and advocating non-racialism and reproductive freedoms in the post-colonial era.

Continued: https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2025-12-16-western-family-values-rhetoric-undermineines-ubuntu-and-reproductive-justice-for/

Abortion in humanitarian settings: What new data from Uganda and Kenya reveal

Incidence and safety of abortion in two humanitarian settings in Uganda and Kenya: a respondent-driven sampling study

December 9, 2025
Ipas

Published in The Lancet Clinical Medicine Led by Ipas in partnership with Ibis Reproductive Health, the International Rescue Committee, African Population and Health Research Centre, and Resilience Action International, this research is one of only a few studies on abortion in humanitarian settings. It provides critical new data on abortion from communities often excluded from sexual and reproductive health research.

Main takeaway: In two of East Africa’s largest refugee settings—Bidibidi (Uganda) and Kakuma (Kenya)—researchers conducted the first-ever study to estimate abortion incidence using respondent-driven sampling (RDS) in a humanitarian context. The results highlight an overlooked reality: displaced people seek abortion care at higher rates but face limited options and extreme risks from resorting to unsafe methods.

Continued: https://www.ipas.org/news/abortion-in-humanitarian-settings-research-uganda-and-kenya/

09.12.2025

Research

abortion in humanitarian settings

African Population and Health Research Centre

Elrha’s Research for Health in Humanitarian Crises Programme

Ibis Reproductive Health

International Rescue Committee

Ipas

Resilience Action International

How a network of women in Latin America transformed safe, self-managed abortions

June 8, 2025
By Marta Martínez, Liana Simstrom
Podcast: 41-Minute Listen

In November 1990, more than 3,000 women descended on the sleepy beach town of San Bernardo del Tuyú, Argentina, for what was becoming a legendary event.

Activists, doctors, academics, social workers and lawyers from across the Americas traveled all the way to attend a feminist gathering known as an Encuentro.

While they publicly debated their political demands, the piece of information that made the biggest impact on the future of abortion was exchanged in private, in whispers.

Continued; https://www.npr.org/2025/06/08/g-s1-68729/latin-america-abortion-activism

08.06.2025

Interviews/Podcasts

'La Escuela Socorrista

abortion accompaniment workshop

abortion manual

abortion pills

abortion support networks

Encuentro Feminista Latinoamericano y del Caribe

First Responders Network

Gabriela Luchetti

green bandana

green wave

Ibis Reproductive Health

Kelly Blanchard

Las Libres

Lesbianas y Feministas por la Descriminalización del Aborto

Lesbians and Feminists for Abortion Decriminalization

self-managed abortion

self-managed abortion manual

Socorristas En Red

Veronica Cruz

Women on Waves

World Health Organization

South Africa – Activists call for more education and access to safe abortions

October 1, 2024

Civil society organisation, Section27, has raised concern over the shortage of registered abortion facilities in the country and a rise of illegal clinics.

The organisation, which recently commemorated International Safe Abortion Day in Braamfontein in the Joburg CBD, went on a spree to take down illegal abortion posters.

Section27 also called on government to strengthen its efforts in providing vital information on this serious medical procedure.

Continued: https://www.yfm.co.za/2024/10/01/activists-call-for-more-education-and-access-to-safe-abortions/

01.10.2024

News

Abortion Support South Africa

Dr Sivuyisiwe Jekwa

Gao Phalaetsile

Ibis Reproductive Health

International Safe Abortion Day

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/

USA – The New Autonomy of Abortion

Since the overturning of Roe v. Wade, abortion freedom now hinges on access to pills.

BY ANDRÉA BECKER
MAY 23, 2024

When 18-year-old Rachel discovered she was unexpectedly pregnant, she made what she thought was a natural first step: call Planned Parenthood to schedule an abortion. “I wasn’t ready to be a parent or a mom,” she says. “And I didn’t want to go through giving birth just to give the kid away.” Even in an abortion-friendly state like Illinois, the nearest Planned Parenthood was one hour away, and there wasn’t an available appointment for another month.

When Rachel consulted ob-gyns, they either told her they wouldn’t provide an abortion or declined to provide recommendations. And since her insurance doesn’t cover abortion care, she’d have to pay the expensive fee out of pocket. “I just wanted it to be over with,” she says.

Continued: https://www.yesmagazine.org/issue/access/2024/05/23/the-new-autonomy-of-abortion

A New Study on Medication Abortion Refutes the Arguments Conservatives Are Taking to the Supreme Court

A study of more than 6,000 medication abortions obtained through telehealth found 98 percent were effective and 99.8 percent were safe.

JULIANNE MCSHANE, Mother Jones
Feb 16, 2024

A key argument from anti-abortion activists bringing a case to the Supreme Court is that medication abortion—which accounts for more than half of all abortions nationwide, according to the Guttmacher Institute—is unsafe and ineffective.

A new study provides even more evidence that this is not true and that medication abortion is just as safe when it’s prescribed virtually as in person. Published Thursday in the journal Nature Medicine, the study examined more than 6,000 medication abortions that people from 20 states and Washington, D.C. obtained from three virtual clinics between April 2021 and January 2022. Researchers found that about 98 percent of them were effective in terminating pregnancies without any additional interventions and that 99.8 percent were safe and “not followed by serious adverse events.”

Continued: https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2024/02/a-new-study-on-medication-abortion-refutes-the-arguments-conservatives-are-taking-to-the-supreme-court/

16.02.2024

Commentary

Charlotte Lozier Institute

Dana Johnson

Food and Drug Administration

Ibis Reproductive Health

medication abortion

mifepristone

retractions of anti-choice studies

safety of abortion pills

South Africa – Unsafe abortions continue to proliferate due to a lack of knowledge, stigma and nurses’ attitudes

Noxolo Majavu
28 Sep 2023

Despite safe medical abortion services being offered for free in public health facilities, the number of backdoor abortions being performed, especially on teenagers, is increasingly escalating as bogus doctors profit from the desperation of young women.

The scarcity of nurses and skill shortages, along with the lack of knowledge and the stigma around abortion, are among the reasons young people still opt for terminating pregnancies through illegal abortions at backdoor clinics.

Continued: https://www.news24.com/citypress/news/unsafe-abortions-continue-to-proliferate-due-to-a-lack-of-knowledge-stigma-and-nurses-attitudes-20230928

Misoprostol Alone Safely Ends Pregnancies After 10 Weeks, Study Suggests

Most women who took abortion drugs were successful even at later gestation periods, researchers reported. Many used only misoprostol, not the usual two-drug combination.

By Roni Caryn Rabin
July 6, 2023

An overwhelming majority of women were able to end unwanted pregnancies with abortion medications on their own and without additional medical procedures, even if they were well beyond the first trimester, according to a report published on Thursday.

The study was based on the experiences of 264 women who were nine to 16 weeks pregnant in Argentina, Nigeria and an unnamed country in Southeast Asia where abortion is illegal. Almost half of the women took only one drug, misoprostol, instead of the standard two-drug regimen, mifepristone and misoprostol.

Continued: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/06/health/abortion-misoprostol.html

06.07.2023

Research

Dr. Daniel Grossman

Ibis Reproductive Health

medication abortion

medication up to 16 weeks

mifepristone

misoprostol

Ruvani Jayaweera

self-managed abortion

USA – People are using abortion medication later in their pregnancies. Here’s what that means.

The regimen is common and considered safe after 10 weeks, but the delays are cause for concern.

By Anna North
Jun 18, 2023

A patient takes one medication, mifepristone, which stops the pregnancy from developing, followed one to two days later by another medication, misoprostol, which induces contractions that empty the uterus. The regimen, approved for abortions in the US since 2000, is effective and very safe, according to physicians and researchers, with a low incidence of serious side effects, and it’s the most common method of abortion in the US. It’s approved by the Food and Drug Administration for the first 70 days, or 10 weeks, of pregnancy, though the World Health Organization recommends medication abortion for up to 12 weeks.

Since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last summer, however, nothing about abortion is simple anymore. With near-total abortion bans in place in more than a dozen states and gestational limits in several others, the procedure is growing harder to access by the day. Meanwhile, a federal court case is casting further doubt on the future of mifepristone’s availability in the US.

Continued: https://www.vox.com/23755658/abortion-pill-second-trimester-mifepristone-misoprostol