‘If we can do it, you can do it’: US anti-abortion groups ramp up activities in UK

Emboldened by victories at home, some of the most prominent American anti-abortion groups are exporting their tactics overseas

Katherine Stewart
Sun 2 Apr 2023

Anti-abortion groups are stepping up efforts to spread US-style abortion politics to the UK, ramping up spending with the ambition of shaking up political life beyond American borders.

Fresh off their historic victory in bringing about the end of the constitutional right to abortion in the US, these groups are importing familiar tactics, including public protests and demonstrations, anti-abortion counseling centers or so-called “crisis pregnancy centers”, and the cultivation of ties with clerical leaders.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/apr/02/us-anti-abortion-groups-uk-far-right

Gender equality isn’t possible without abortion and contraception

Access to reproductive health protects women and girls, uplifts them and allows them to prosper.

Banchiamlack Dessalegn, Africa Director at MSI Reproductive Choices
Published On 18 Mar 2023

It is Women’s History Month and the world is bursting with proclamations of support for gender equality and women’s rights. But too often, the general narrative celebrating historical progress on gender issues leaves out abortion and contraception, sidelining the fact that without them, gender equality would have been – and still is – impossible.

This year, millions of women and girls will be denied access to abortion, forced to carry unintended pregnancies to term or resort to unsafe termination. Abortion continues to be unjustly restricted across the world, most recently in the United States, where new state bans are being introduced with the Supreme Court’s decision to rescind the legal protection of abortion established in the 1970s.

Continued: https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2023/3/18/gender-equality-isnt-possible-without-abortion-and-contraception

18.03.2023

Opinion

Banchiamlack Dessalegn

gender equality

maternal mortality

MSI Reproductive Choices

Women's History Month

Abortion UK: Women ‘manipulated’ in crisis pregnancy advice centres

Feb 27, 2023
By Eleanor Layhe & Divya Talwar, BBC Panorama

Women are being misled and manipulated about abortion by some crisis pregnancy advice centres in the UK, according to evidence from a Panorama investigation.

The centres operate outside the NHS and tend to be registered charities. Most say they don't refer women for abortions, but offer support and counselling for unplanned pregnancies.

Continued: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-64751800

Google adverts direct pregnant women to services run by UK anti-abortion groups

The tech giant is carrying adverts styled to look like real internet search results for women seeking pregnancy advice

Shanti Das
Sat 25 Feb 2023

Women seeking online advice about abortions are being directed to pregnancy counselling services run by anti-abortion campaigners, an Observer investigation has found.

Google adverts that are styled to look like real search results and appear above genuine listings are routinely being shown to people searching key terms relating to pregnancy and abortion.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/feb/25/google-adverts-direct-pregnant-women-anti-abortion-groups

UK facing crisis point in abortion provision, experts say

Women said to be travelling hundreds of miles for appointments or waiting several weeks

Lucy Hough and Hannah Moore
Thu 26 Jan 2023

The UK is facing a “crisis point” in abortion provision, experts say, with rising demand and restricted access to care in many areas putting unprecedented pressure on struggling NHS services.

Healthcare professionals described a “terrifying” state of affairs in which women are travelling hundreds of miles for appointments or waiting several weeks before they are seen.

Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2023/jan/26/uk-facing-crisis-point-in-abortion-provision-experts-say

26.01.2023

Featured

News

Bpas

British Pregnancy Advisory Service

Clare Murphy

Jonathan Lord

MSI Reproductive Choices

Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists

Tracey Masters

travelling for abortion

Europe

United Kingdom

Health

U.S. Anti-Abortion Activists Are Spreading Clinic Protests Around the World

The Texas-based group 40 Days for Life has brought its aggressive tactics to more than 1,000 cities in 65 countries.

Jessica Bateman
January 9, 2023

There were four or five protesters outside Queen Elizabeth University Hospital in Glasgow, Scotland, the first time Dr. Greg Irwin saw them. He was driving to his job as a consultant radiologist when he noticed the group hoisting placards opposite the parking lot, close to the maternity unit. BEFORE I FORMED YOU IN THE WOMB I KNEW YOU, one sign read, alongside a Bible reference. “Oh, my God,” Irwin thought. “It’s one of those American protests.”

After he parked in his usual spot, an older woman holding rosary beads smiled as he approached. “We’re holding a prayer vigil,” she explained, adding that they were offering “support and advice” to women. Irwin noticed their placards were branded with the logo of 40 Days for Life. When he googled the name later that night, he expected to find a local church organization. Instead, he discovered the shiny, high-budget website of a Texas-based group, emblazoned with pictures of men in sharp suits with dazzling white teeth. A counter in the corner ticked down the numbers of babies “saved” worldwide. Scrolling, he saw a map festooned with red pins, marking group locations all over the world. Irwin stared at his screen, bewildered. How could there be a connection between a group in Texas and the woman outside his hospital in Scotland?

Continued: https://newrepublic.com/article/169587/us-anti-abortion-activists-spreading-clinic-protests-around-world

09.01.2023

40 Days for Life Croatia

Abby Johnson

Abortion Access Front

Alice Murray

American Life League

anti-choice harassment

anti-choice intimidation

anti-choice misogyny

anti-choice protesters

British Pregnancy Advisory Service

buffer zones

Catholic Church

Center for Reproductive Rights

Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act

MSI Reproductive Choices

Northern Ireland abortion buffer zones ruling is a huge win for reproductive rights

Jade Biggs
Thu, 8 December 2022

Lawmakers in Northern Ireland can now create buffer zones around abortion clinics, following a ruling from the UK's Supreme Court. The decision means that Northern Ireland is the first part of the UK to bring in legislation on abortion clinic buffer zones – although this was rolled out on a local council level in England and Wales earlier this year.

The Supreme Court's unanimous decision allows the Northern Ireland assembly to proceed with introducing safe access zones to protect abortion clinic users and staff. The move is part of the Assembly's new Abortion Services Bill, which will criminalise those who enter abortion clinic buffer zones with the intention of influencing attendees.

Continued: https://uk.sports.yahoo.com/news/northern-ireland-abortion-buffer-zones-130700674.html

How the US scrapping of Roe v Wade threatens the global medical abortion revolution

Medical abortions are a global success story, and not one that will be easily derailed by the legislative backsliding in the US. Time, now, to close the access gaps, report Sally Howard and Geetanjali Krishna

BMJ 2022; 379
doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.o2349 (Published 19 October 2022)

Sally Howard, Geetanjali Krishna

In 2021, a 20 year old woman in Hyderabad, India, discovered she was pregnant.
A well educated, city girl, she was nevertheless afraid of the stigma attached
to unmarried pregnancy and did not know if she could legally terminate the
pregnancy. Around the same time, another young couple living together in
Bengaluru were in a similar predicament.

“Both women were not ready for a child but completely clueless about the
options they had, and the gestation period up to which abortion is legally
allowed in India,” says Anusha Pilli, a doctor who practises privately in
Hyderabad. Pilli helped both women to get medical abortions before their first
trimesters ended.

Continued: https://www.bmj.com/content/379/bmj.o2349

There’s a new surveillance state – and women are the target

Period tracking apps, car licence plate data and pregnancy registers are the latest tools experts warn are being harnessed to monitor women

By Harriet Barber, GLOBAL HEALTH REPORTER
7 October 2022

Surveillance data and technology are being exploited to stoke fear and prevent abortions in countries including the United States, China, Hungary and Poland.

Period tracking apps, car licence plate data and pregnancy registers are the latest tools activists warn are being harnessed to stop women using legal or geographic loopholes for terminations. All four countries have reversed abortion rights over the past two years.

Continued: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/women-and-girls/new-abortion-surveillance-state-keeping-tabs-women/

What Ethiopia can teach the US about abortion rights

Unsafe abortions once killed hundreds of Ethiopian women each year. Not any more.

Banchiamlack Dessalegn, Africa Director at MSI Reproductive Choices.
28 Sep 2022

As an Ethiopian American, I am disturbed that the United States is rolling back the reproductive rights of American women and girls, one state at a time. Unlike most Americans today, I grew up in a country where abortion bans once restricted reproductive autonomy and claimed many lives.

Now I believe that the same country – Ethiopia – can provide a valuable lesson for activists and providers looking to resurrect rights that were guaranteed through Roe v Wade until it was overturned by the US Supreme Court earlier this year.

Continued: https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2022/9/28/what-ethiopia-can-teach-america-about-abortion-rights

28.09.2022