Telemedicine abortion is winning — and that terrifies the right

by Julie F. Kay, opinion contributor
Dec 21, 2025

As we wrap up the year, let’s decree 2025 a glass-half-full year for abortion rights. The year’s headlines were consumed by doom and gloom coverage. From hits against Planned Parenthood to increasingly restrictive anti-abortion laws passing in red states, and threats to proven-safe abortion medications, the post-Roe landscape certainly appeared bleak.

Yet while news cycles focused on abortion bans and restrictions, a quiet revolution happened. Telemedicine abortion transformed the geography of abortion access nationwide. Although most pro-choice Americans remain unaware that telemedicine abortion is an option, patients seeking abortions have widely embraced it. More than a quarter of all abortions in the U.S. were provided via telemedicine in 2025.

Continued: https://thehill.com/opinion/healthcare/5653331-telemedicine-abortion-rights-2025/

21.12.2025

self-managed abortion

shield laws

telemedicine abortion

The Abortion Pill Underground

Since Roe was overturned, thousands of people in red states have found a way to get an abortion—often thanks to providers operating at the edge of the law.

AMY LITTLEFIELD
May 7, 2024

When Kay found out she was pregnant at the end of last year, she knew three things clearly. “I was poor and I had an unwanted pregnancy and knew I couldn’t afford a standard abortion for hundreds of dollars,” she told me. A 29-year-old student already raising one child, Kay lives in Texas, where abortion is banned. The nearest clinic she could find was at least a 12-hour drive away. But Kay thought there might be another option. “I went to Google and started searching if it was possible somehow to receive abortion pills through the Internet.”

It was not only possible; it was much easier and more affordable than Kay had expected. She found online services that offered to ship the same medications that were available in clinics right to her doorstep in Texas for $150 or, if she couldn’t afford that, for free. It seemed so simple that Kay thought it might be a scam. “I was scared I would wait for the pills and they wouldn’t work when I got them,” she said.

Continued: https://www.thenation.com/article/society/telehealth-abortion-shield-laws/

07.05.2024

Commentary

Abortion Care Network

Abortion Coalition for Telemedicine

abortion funds

abortion pills

abortion pills by mail

Abuzz

Aid Access

Center for Reproductive Rights

Choices Women’s Medical Center

in-person requirement

Miscarriage and Abortion Hotline

National Network of Abortion Funds

self-managed abortion

shield laws

Susan Yanow

telemedicine abortion

How to Protect US Reproductive Rights in 2024

We need more people who believe in abortion as a human right to stand up for telemedicine abortion and protect access to mifepristone.

JULIE F. KAY
Dec 31, 2023

To paraphrase Charles Dickens, 2023 has been the “best of times and the worst of times” for abortion rights in America. Where you live, how much money you have, and whether you’re more than six weeks pregnant determine whether you can access your human rights.

The best news this year is that telemedicine abortion shield laws came to full fruition in five states. These new laws provide medical providers with protection from criminal and civil charges or license revocation so they can provide abortion pills by telemedicine nationwide.

Continued: https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/us-reproductive-rights-2024

31.12.2023

Abortion Coalition for Telemedicine

severe fetal anomalies

shield laws

telemedicine abortion

Blue-state doctors launch abortion pill pipeline into states with bans

by Caroline Kitchener, The Washington Post
July 23, 2023

The doctor starts each day with a list of addresses and a label maker.

Sitting in her basement in New York's Hudson Valley, next to her grown children's old bunk beds, she reviews the list of towns and cities she'll be mailing to that day: Baton Rouge, Tucson, Houston.

A month ago, a phone call was the only thing the doctor could offer to women in states with abortion bans who faced unexpected pregnancies. Hamstrung by the laws, she could only coach them through the process of taking abortion pills they received from overseas suppliers.

Continued: https://www.texarkanagazette.com/news/2023/jul/23/blue-state-doctors-launch-abortion-pill-pipeline/

USA – “In the end we will win”: The faces of the fight for abortion rights

The Supreme Court’s decision to end federal protections for abortion access didn’t just rewind the clock 50 years, it opened a Pandora’s box of confusing, potentially life-threatening legal complications. VF talks with five women on the front lines.

BY ABIGAIL TRACY AND ERIN VANDERHOOF
PHOTOGRAPHY BY DIANA MARKOSIAN AND DRU DONOVAN
OCTOBER 12, 2022

Tattooed on Caitlin Bernard’s left foot is the image of a coat hanger and the words “Trust Women.” The 38-year-old Indiana-based ob-gyn got it years ago; it was intended as a reminder of life before Roe v. Wade. Bernard has long paired her medical career with advocacy. She was a plaintiff in an unsuccessful 2019 American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit to reverse Indiana’s near-total ban on second-trimester abortions. Post-Roe, Indiana became the first state to pass an abortion ban. Now, Bernard is girding for another legal fight—this time against Republican Indiana attorney general Todd Rokita, who she says maligned her practice as Bernard became a lightning rod in one of the most publicized cases after the Dobbs decision stripped federal abortion protections and turned the country into a patchwork of disparate laws.

Continued: https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2022/10/the-fight-for-abortion-rights

USA – We can’t count on the Supreme Court to save abortion rights. We’ll have to do it ourselves

BY ROBIN ABCARIAN, COLUMNIST
OCT. 31, 2021

We have to face a disheartening fact: This country’s Supreme Court is no longer committed to protecting our constitutional rights.

The justices are believed to be on the verge of overturning Roe vs. Wade, or at least whittling it down to a meaningless stub by allowing brutally restrictive state abortion laws to stand.

Continued: https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2021-10-31/abortion-rights-supreme-court

USA – Why Congress must abolish the most destructive abortion restriction ever passed

By KATHRYN KOLBERT AND JULIE F. KAY
JUNE 5, 2021

Three years after the Supreme Court legalized abortion in Roe vs. Wade in 1973, Congress made it significantly harder for low-income women to access the procedure by passing the Hyde Amendment, which bans federal Medicaid funding for abortions. It was upheld by the Supreme Court in 1980 — and remains in effect.

In our view it is the most destructive abortion restriction ever passed.

Continued: https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2021-06-05/biden-hyde-amendment-budget-abortion