USA – Is the ‘tech bro-ification’ of abortion here?

Repro workers and tech experts reveal startling gaps between the promises offered by abortion technologies and the realities facing abortion-seekers and support workers

by Nicole Froio and Jade Jasmine Hurley
June 11th, 2025

Since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, abortion tech has emerged as a potential solution for an increasingly prohibitive reproductive rights landscape…

This exclusive Prism investigation delves into the role of tech in reproductive health care, finding gaps in how abortion workers are served by tech initiatives, a clash between funding abortion tech and industry layoffs, and tension in how best to address the changing legal landscape for abortion. Interviews with a dozen reproductive health workers, tech specialists, abortion fund staff, and reproductive rights advocates further revealed a lack of investment in backend tools for abortion support workers navigating a progressively underfunded field.

Continued: https://prismreports.org/2025/06/11/abortion-tech-repro-workers/

11.06.2025

Commentary

abortion and tech

abortion and technology

abortion apps

abortion chatbot

Abortion Freedom Fund

Abortion Policy API

Aid Access

Amy Merrill

automated abortion finder

Carolina Abortion Fund

Cathy Torres

Cecile Richards

Charley app

crisis pregnancy centers

If/When/How: Lawyering for Reproductive Justice

National Network of Abortion Funds

self-managed abortion

USA – How a network of abortion pill providers works together in the wake of new threats

Groups such as Aid Access, Hey Jane and Just the Pill stay in close contact to help women seeking abortions in states with bans.

April 7, 2024
By Abigail Brooks and Dasha Burns

When the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in March about restricting access to the abortion drug mifepristone, Elisa Wells, co-founder and co-director of Plan C, was ready. Plan C, an information resource that connects women to abortion pill providers, almost immediately saw a spike in searches for the medication.

With Florida’s Supreme Court paving the way for the state’s six-week abortion ban, Wells says she’s expecting even more search activity and more creative thinking from providers.

Continued: https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/network-abortion-pill-providers-works-together-wake-new-threats-rcna146678

Abortion rights advocates say consequences dire if U.S. Supreme Court declines to hear pill case

BY: SOFIA RESNICK
OCTOBER 6, 2023

More than a year after the U.S. Supreme Court decided states could set their own abortion laws, including bans, the nation’s highest court now could cut off abortion access in states where abortion is still legal.

The Supreme Court began its new term this week and has yet to announce whether it will hear Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine v. U.S. Food and Drug Administration, before the term ends in June 2024. This case was designed by the religious right to overturn the approval of the commonly used abortion drug mifepristone. But whatever the court does — even if it declines to hear the case — will further alter healthcare access in the U.S., reproductive health advocates said on a call to reporters Thursday.

Continued: https://ncnewsline.com/2023/10/06/abortion-rights-advocates-say-consequences-dire-if-u-s-supreme-court-declines-to-hear-pill-case/

If the “Abortion Pill” Gets Banned, There’s Still One Good Move

A less famous drug can also do the job.

BY CHRISTINA CAUTERUCCI
FEB 13, 2023

When people refer to “the abortion pill,” they’re usually talking about mifepristone, the progesterone-inhibiting drug that was developed in France in the 1980s and approved in the U.S. in 2000. This month, a right-wing federal judge appointed by Donald Trump could outlaw that pill nationwide in response to a lawsuit brought by anti-abortion activists in Texas.

It’s an alarming possibility that underscores the recklessness of giving politicians and appointees full authority over the nation’s reproductive health: An unelected official could singlehandedly revoke the FDA’s approval of a safe, widely used medication—and the Supreme Court may be inclined to let him.

Continued: https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2023/02/abortion-pill-ban-texas-mifepristone-misoprostol.html

13.02.2023

Commentary

Carafem

Food and Drug Administration

50 years after Roe v. Wade, many abortion providers are changing how they do business

January 22, 2023
Sarah McCammon
4-Minute Listen with Transcript

The 50th anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision would have been a day of celebration for many abortion-rights supporters. But this milestone anniversary, on January 22, falls just short of seven months after another landmark abortion decision: the Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization ruling issued June 24 that overturned Roe.

After Dobbs, many clinics in red states where restrictive abortion laws have been enacted have been forced to close their doors and move, or stay open and dramatically shift the services they're providing.

Continued: https://www.npr.org/2023/01/22/1150574240/50-years-roe-v-wade-dobbs-abortion-providers-reinvent

Telehealth abortion providers eye new options for patients under loosened FDA rules

By Katie Palmer
Jan. 9, 2023

In the past year, there’s been a significant surge in interest in medication abortion via telehealth, after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade and the Food and Drug Administration made it possible for patients to get a prescription online and have the drug delivered to their front doors.

Now, telemedicine patients will have more pathways to care. A finalized rule from the FDA makes permanent the ability to distribute the medication by mail, while newly allowing retail pharmacies to distribute mifepristone, one of two drugs used to safely end an early pregnancy.

Continued: https://www.statnews.com/2023/01/09/abortion-telehealth-online-pharmacy-mifepristone/

‘Necessary to Disobey Harmful Laws’: These ‘Abortion Pirates’ Want Equal Access to Abortion Pills Worldwide

A colorful crowd of doctors, researchers and women’s activists convened in the Latvian capital to explore ways to use pills to circumvent anti-abortion laws.

By EMILY SCHULTHEIS
11/26/2022

RIGA, Latvia — For two sunny, crisp autumn days in mid-September, Riga’s Stradiņš University felt like the epicenter of a self-styled global civil rights movement: to give every person, in every culture or country, regardless of laws, access to abortion pills.

In the hallways, women pored over posters showing the latest research on the effectiveness of abortion pills and other developments in abortion and contraception care. Representatives from pharmaceutical companies enthusiastically pitched their medications and products to doctors sipping coffee and tea during a break between panels. There were graphic novels about an at-home medical abortion and T-shirts printed with women’s self-stated reasons for ending a pregnancy; there were slogans printed on T-shirts like “Make Abortion Legal Again” and a video promoting abortion rights to the tune of Lady Gaga’s “Bad Romance.”

Continued: https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2022/11/26/global-abortion-rights-movement-latvia-00069224

26.11.2022

abortion pills at home

abortion pirates

Abortion Support Network

Abortion Without Borders

Family Planning Advisory Service

National Network of Abortion Funds

Plan C

Rebecca Gomperts

self-induced abortion

self-managed abortion

Women’s Reproductive Rights Assistance Project

After Roe, abortion’s underground railroad gains steam

A network of activists is helping women terminate pregnancies in countries where the procedure is banned.

BY CARLO MARTUSCELLI, EMILY SCHULTHEIS, MANDOLINE RUTKOWSKI AND JAKUB KORUS
OCTOBER 29, 2022

RIGA — If you want to get an abortion in Poland, Kinga Jelinska is happy to help. Legally terminating your pregnancy is almost impossible in the Eastern European country. Abortion is only allowed in the case of rape or incest, or when it threatens the life of the woman.

That’s where Jelinska comes in. She’s the co-founder and executive director of Women Help Women, an Amsterdam-based nonprofit that helps provide women with the pills needed for an at-home medical abortion. The service Jelinska’s group provides falls into a legal grey zone; self-induced abortion is illegal in a number of countries, but in Poland, it’s not explicitly banned.

Continued: https://www.politico.eu/article/roe-v-wade-europe-abortion-pill-illegal-underground-network/

USA – The Other Abortion Pill

In the U.S., medication abortion usually consists of two drugs. One of them has always mattered more.|

By Patrick Adams
SEPTEMBER 19, 2022

In the months since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, demand for medication abortion has soared. The method already accounted for more than half of all abortions in the United States before the Court’s decision; now reproductive-rights activists and sites such as Plan C, which shares information about medication abortion by mail, are fielding an explosion in interest in abortion pills. As authorized by the FDA, medication abortion consists of two drugs. The first one, mifepristone, blocks the hormone progesterone, which is necessary for a pregnancy to continue. The second, misoprostol, brings on contractions of the uterus that expel its contents. The combination is, according to studies conducted in the U.S., somewhere between 95 percent and 99 percent effective in ending a pregnancy and is extremely safe.

Continued: https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2022/09/abortion-pill-misoprostol-effectiveness/671465/

Boats, planes and automobiles: Projects aim to travel around restrictive state abortion laws

It’s not illegal to get an abortion off the Gulf coast or in a van in Colorado, critics and lawyers seem to agree. But other challenges remain.

By OLIVIA OLANDER
08/12/2022

In Colorado, abortion medication comes from a van parked near the state border. In Illinois, an organization is recruiting pilots to fly patients out of restrictive states. And in the Gulf of Mexico, an OB-GYN envisions a clinic at sea.

These headline-grabbing projects for abortion access are among the more audacious ways abortion-rights supporters are attempting to skirt state restrictions, and while they may be legal, they won’t be easy to set up or sustain.

https://www.politico.com/news/2022/08/12/restrictive-state-abortion-laws-workaround-access-00051373