Use of ‘at-home abortion pills’ rises amid pandemic – and faces new threats

Medication abortions have are a safe and accessible method of terminating pregnancy, but they have been targeted by onerous FDA restrictions

Cecilia Nowell
Sun 1 Nov 2020

With six conservative justices now sitting on the supreme court, the future of abortion access in US looks increasingly uncertain. But in addition to concerns about whether abortion clinics can stay open, activists are warning that lesser-known abortion medications are also under threat.

Medication abortions have been proven to be a safe and effective method of terminating pregnancy, and because they can be completed without doctor supervision, they serve as a crucial alternative for those who have had other abortion services shuttered in their state, or who do not feel safe accessing traditional health services.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/nov/01/at-home-abortion-pills-increasingly-in-demand-amid-pandemic-under-new-threats

This is the future of abortion in a post-Roe America

The fall of Roe v. Wade won’t end abortion. Here’s what it will do.

By Anna North
Oct 12, 2020

If Roe v. Wade falls, what happens to abortion in America?

That’s the question on a lot of Americans’ minds after the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, with the Supreme Court on the brink of a 6-3 conservative majority. If the Senate confirms President Trump’s nominee, Amy Coney Barrett, the Court will likely have the votes to overturn the landmark 1973 decision that established Americans’ right to terminate a pregnancy.

Continued: https://www.vox.com/21504883/supreme-court-abortion-roe-v-wade-barrett

Buying pills online for an at-home abortion: a lockdown reality

Buying pills online for an at-home abortion: a lockdown reality

Lucie AUBOURG, AFP News
9 May 2020

With the coronavirus crisis raging, women in the United States are increasingly going online to buy their own pills for a "self-managed" abortion

One week after Sally realized she was pregnant, her home state Texas temporarily banned abortions, deeming them unnecessary elective procedures that were suspended because of the coronavirus crisis.

Continued: https://sg.news.yahoo.com/buying-pills-online-home-abortion-lockdown-reality-013043882.html

Self-Managed Abortions May Be More Difficult to Access Right Now—Here’s What You Need to Know

Self-Managed Abortions May Be More Difficult to Access Right Now—Here’s What You Need to Know
With supply chain disruptions in India due to the global COVID-19 pandemic, medication abortion may be less accessible—an issue compounded by anti-choice state officials trying to ban the procedure and the FDA.

Apr 14, 2020
Ray Levy-Uyeda

If you visit aidaccess.org in search of the abortion pill right now, you won’t be able to find what they’re looking for. Aid Access, a website that offers medication abortion pills by mail for people in the United States seeking to self-manage their abortion, has hit a snag in its supply chain, thanks to a halt in trade out of India because of the coronavirus outbreak.

“Because of [COVID-19] the government of India have decided to close all international airports to prevent corona virus outbreak and therefor [sic] the pharmacy in India cannot send the medicines until further notice,” reads a disclosure on the Aid Access website’s consultation page.

Continued: https://rewire.news/article/2020/04/14/self-managed-abortions-may-be-more-difficult-to-access-right-now-heres-what-you-need-to-know/

Abortion clinics see increased demand amid coronavirus: ‘The calls … are frantic’

Abortion clinics see increased demand amid coronavirus: 'The calls ... are frantic'

David Crary, Associated Press
Apr 14, 2020

NEW YORK – The coronavirus outbreak has fueled attempts to ban abortions in some states, but providers where the procedure remains available report increased demand, often from women distraught over economic stress and health concerns linked to the pandemic.

“The calls we’ve been getting are frantic,” said Julie Burkhart, who manages clinics in Wichita, Kansas, and Oklahoma City. “We’ve seen more women coming sooner than they would have because they’re scared they won’t be able to access the services later.”

Continued: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/health/2020/04/13/abortion-clinics-see-high-demand-more-phone-calls-amid-coronavirus/2982538001/

USA – It’s Time For A Revolution In At-Home Abortion

It's Time For A Revolution In At-Home Abortion
The coronavirus pandemic has exposed the fiction that most abortions need to be performed in a clinic setting.

By Melissa Jeltsen, HuffPost US
04/08/2020

The callers wanted to know how to end their pregnancies without going outside. Many were afraid to travel for fear of contracting the coronavirus, which spreads through contact with others. Some didn’t have the financial resources to make an arduous, often multi-day trip to an abortion clinic. Others were stuck in states where abortions were temporarily halted by Republican leaders exploiting the crisis to erode access.

Faced with dwindling options, callers to the helpline run by the reproductive rights group If/When/How, were considering “self-managed abortion,” loosely defined as ending a pregnancy without the formal supervision of a health care professional. Calls to the confidential helpline have more than doubled in the past two weeks, according to Jill Adams, the group’s executive director.

Continued: https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/abortion-at-home-medication-abortion_n_5e8cd4e6c5b62459a9304428?ri18n=true&ncid=NEWSSTAND0001

USA – Self-Managed Abortion Is Medically Very Safe. But Is It Legally Safe?

Self-Managed Abortion Is Medically Very Safe. But Is It Legally Safe?

4/1/2020
by Carrie N. Baker

Between 1969 and 1973, feminists in Chicago with no formal medical training formed an underground abortion service called Jane that performed nearly 12,000 safe illegal abortions.

Today, as many states increasingly restrict medical professionals’ ability to offer abortion, women are once again finding ways to access safe abortion on their own.

Continued: https://msmagazine.com/2020/04/01/self-managed-abortion-is-medically-very-safe-but-is-it-legally-safe/

USA – Activists Are Now Teaching Women How to Have Abortions at Home

Activists Are Now Teaching Women How to Have Abortions at Home
“So long as we have a safe option that can be accomplished outside of a clinical or medical setting, there’s no reason that shouldn’t also be available.”

by Carter Sherman
Jan 22 2020

COLUMBIA, Missouri — In the Columbia Public Library, just past a room where a Bible study was wrapping up, a group of people gathered in a conference room to learn how to have an abortion at home.

What happens when you self-induce an abortion? one woman asked the panelists, who sat at a table in the front of the room.

Continued: https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/xgqywj/activists-are-now-teaching-women-how-to-have-abortions-at-home

How to Give Yourself an Abortion

How to Give Yourself an Abortion

January 9, 2020
Posted by Arielle Swernoff
Illustrated by Matt Lubchansky

For as long as people have gotten pregnant, people have given themselves abortions. Historically, these methods have varied from the brutal to the toxic to the bizarre.

But history hasn’t always gotten it wrong. From the Bronze Age until the 1st or 2nd century BCE, silphium, a plant native to Libya, was used as a safe and effective contraceptive and abortifacient. It’s said the plant was so popular that it was harvested to extinction. More recently, enslaved black people in the American South devised numerous herbal treatments to terminate unwanted pregnancies, some of which are still used today.

Continued: https://jewishcurrents.org/how-to-give-yourself-an-abortion/

USA – Abortion After the Clinic

Abortion After the Clinic
As Republican lawmakers try to legislate it out of existence, the future of reproductive healthcare may be at home.

By Irin Carmon
Nov 11, 2019

When Leana Wen introduced herself to America as the new president of Planned Parenthood last fall, she had a story she liked to tell — one that showed exactly why abortion access mattered. It was a sad tale of “a young woman lying on a stretcher, pulseless and unresponsive, because of a home abortion.” Wen, an emergency physician who had been plucked from Baltimore’s Health Department to take over the century-old institution, said the young woman had arrived at her ER in “a pool of blood” because “she didn’t have access to health care, so she had her cousin attempt an abortion on her at home. We did everything we could to resuscitate her, but she died.”

Wen was talking about a time when abortion was technically legal, yet the story rhymed with the pre-Roe era, when doctors and lawyers spoke of being radicalized by women filling their wards with blood and desperation, the same nightmare the familiar pro-choice rhetoric warns will soon be upon us. Behind the scenes, however, a vanguard of the abortion-rights movement implored Wen, directly and through intermediaries, to stop talking about “home abortion” in such dire terms.

Continued: https://www.thecut.com/2019/11/future-abortion-access-america.html

11.11.2019