Abortion Bans Are Making It Impossible for Advocates to Help Abuse Victims

“To have to say to someone, ‘You live in a state where you’re more likely to be criminalized than the person who’s abusing you’—it’s devastating,” If/When/How’s Sara Ainsworth told Jezebel.

By Kylie Cheung
March 26, 2025

In 2007, Erica DuBois learned she was pregnant just two months after becoming cancer-free. And then the abuse began, she recalled to Jezebel. Her partner would invoke religion to justify physically harming her: “He talked about the beatings and violence like a test—if the baby survived, then it was God’s will,” DuBois said. She eventually gave birth to a healthy baby girl, but as a result of these sustained beatings, her first pregnancy was the only one that didn’t end in a miscarriage. She sometimes tried to take birth control pills, but when her abuser found them, he punished her. This violence would only escalate when she inevitably became pregnant.

Continued: https://www.jezebel.com/abortion-bans-are-making-it-impossible-for-advocates-to-help-abuse-victims

Our Abortion Stories: ‘I’m a Registered Nurse, a Wife and a Mother. This Story Is Personal and Painful.’

Feb 13, 2024
by AMY ROGERS

My name is Amy Rogers; I’m a registered nurse, a wife and a mother. I am writing this in support of House Bill 12, the Women’s Health Protection Act. This story is personal and painful. I am sharing this for myself, my daughters, and the 25 million women of childbearing age living in states with abortion bans or restrictions.

In 2011, my husband and I were newlyweds. We had primary custody of his 8-year-old son and 12-year-old daughter. I had just turned 43 and was shocked and delighted to discover that I was pregnant. Due to my age, I assumed my chances of conceiving without fertility treatments were slim to none.

Continued: https://msmagazine.com/2024/02/13/dobbs-abortion-story-healthcare-genetic-testing-abnormality-womens-health-protection-act/

States with restrictive abortion laws place more kids in foster care

By Jen Christensen, CNN
Nov 6, 2023

A new study finds that in states with certain restrictive abortion laws, even before the US Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, the number of children whose parents couldn’t or wouldn’t care for them increased and their children end up in foster care.

The study, published Monday in JAMA Pediatrics, found that there was an 11% increase in children placed in foster care in states with certain abortion restrictions called TRAP laws, following the enactment of those TRAP laws, relative to states without such abortion restrictions.

Continued: https://www.komu.com/news/nationworld/states-with-restrictive-abortion-laws-place-more-kids-in-foster-care/article_816763e4-3c7c-5129-b3ac-7240ebfcc4d8.html

06.11.2023

News

Research

adoption

adoption and abortion

Dr. Savannah Atkins

Dr. Tracey Wilkinson

foster care system

Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers

Overturning Roe v. Wade increased mental health distress in women, study finds

Unsurprisingly, taking away rights is spurring anxiety on a mass scale

By NICOLE KARLIS
PUBLISHED APRIL 2, 2023

In June 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the landmark ruling Roe v. Wade, thus ending the federal enshrinement of abortion rights in America. Immediately after being overturned, the American Psychiatric Association (APA) warned that such a historic overturn would likely take a toll on women's mental health.

"By dismantling nearly 50 years of legal precedent, the Court has jeopardized the physical and mental health of millions of American women and undermined the privacy of the physician-patient relationship," the APA said in a statement. "This move will disproportionately impact our most vulnerable populations, such as communities of color, people living in rural areas and those with low incomes who may have to travel long distances to receive abortions."

Continued: https://www.salon.com/2023/04/02/overturning-roe-v-wade-increased-mental-health-distress-in-women-study-finds/

02.04.2023

Commentary

America Psychiatric Association

Census Bureau Household Pulse Survey

Journal of the American Medical Association

Julie Bindeman

mental health and abortion

mental health effects of abortion denial

Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers

United States

Health

Human Rights

USA – Abortion restrictions may have increased suicide risk among women ages 20 to 34, new research suggests

A first-of-its-kind study found an association between laws that restrict abortions and suicide rates in younger women.

Dec. 28, 2022
By Aria Bendix

Restricted access to abortions may have increased the risk of suicide among women of reproductive age for more than four decades, new research from the University of Pennsylvania suggests.

Though suicide deaths are rare, they are the second leading cause of death among women ages 20-24 in the U.S. and the third leading cause among women ages 25-34.

Continued: https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/abortion-restrictions-may-increased-suicide-risk-younger-women-rcna63358

28.12.2022

Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers

USA – Lies about abortion have dictated health policy

By Tamara Kay and Susan Ostermann, Chicago Tribune
Dec 05, 2022

Since the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in June that abortion policy should be decided at the state level, a number of high-profile abortion issues have appeared on state ballots. In each of these cases — even in conservative states — voters have chosen to support abortion rights. With voters increasingly being asked to make abortion policy, it is critical that they understand the facts in order to make informed decisions.

During the last 50 years, lies and intentional misinformation have dictated abortion health policy in the U.S. Abortion has been demonized and characterized by utter falsities; it has gone under the radar for far too long.

Continued: https://www.chicagotribune.com/opinion/commentary/ct-opinion-abortion-misinformation-health-policy-trap-laws-20221205-ildvxeb66bblfc2qml3xcvsfu4-story.html

What abortion access looks like in America even before the Supreme Court reconsiders Roe v. Wade

By Tierney Sneed, CNN
Sat October 9, 2021

(CNN)The blockbuster clash over Roe v. Wade now in front of the Supreme Court comes after a successful, decades-long guerrilla warfare campaign by the anti-abortion movement to attack access to the procedure around the edges.

Since the 1973 decision that enshrined a constitutional right to an abortion, activists and their partners in statehouses across the country have enacted more than 1,300 laws that have made the procedure more difficult to obtain.

Continued: https://www.cnn.com/2021/10/09/politics/abortion-restrictions-roe-v-wade-access-supreme-court/index.html

Four Women Reflect on Traveling Out of State for Their Abortions

As a new Texas law restricts access to abortion, we speak to women who previously traveled for such medical care.

BY DANIELLE CAMPOAMOR
September 21, 2021

On Wednesday, September 1, a near-total abortion ban went into effect in the state of Texas, outlawing abortion past six weeks gestation—before most people even know they’re pregnant. Given pre-existing anti-abortion laws that already made it difficult for Texans to access abortion care—including a 24-hour mandatory waiting period, mandatory counseling, and targeted restrictions on abortion providers (TRAP) that previously shuttered over half of all abortion clinics in the state—many will now have to travel out of state to receive the healthcare they need. As a result of this latest law, the average one-way driving distance to an abortion clinic in Texas has increased 20 fold, from 12 miles to 248 miles, according to the Guttmacher Institute.

But people have been traveling to receive abortion care long before Texas’s abortion ban went into effect.

Continued: https://www.cntraveler.com/story/four-women-reflect-on-traveling-out-of-state-for-their-abortions

What U.S. abortion access looks like, in graphics

States are passing more abortion restrictions, which could reshape what abortion access looks like across the country.

July 25, 2021
By Chloe Atkins

The current landscape of abortion access in the United States came into focus in May after the Supreme Court decided to consider the legality of Mississippi's ban on nearly all abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. Mississippi’s restriction was the first to reach the court from a wave of state laws intended to strike down Roe v. Wade, the decision that established the constitutional right to an abortion nationwide.

The first major abortion case since the confirmation of Justice Amy Coney Barrett solidified a conservative majority comes as state legislatures around the country have brought a historic number of laws seeking to tighten abortion access.

Continued: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/what-u-s-abortion-access-looks-graphics-n1274859

An Abortion Provider Discusses His Biggest Fears Over Texas’ Abortion ‘Bounty’ Law

Will other states follow Texas’ lead? Will clinics be able to withstand the potential onslaught of lawsuits? “We have no idea what this is going to look like,” says Dr. Bhavik Kumar.

JULY 16, 2021
By TESSA STUART

Dr. Bhavik Kumar has been a Texas abortion provider for six years, with the last two at the Planned Parenthood Center for Choice in Houston, Texas. He started practicing shortly after House Bill 2 — the last Texas abortion law to go all the way to the Supreme Court before it was struck down as unconstitutional — went into effect. In the three years between the law’s passage and the Supreme Court’s decision, HB2 forced roughly half of Texas’ abortion providers to shut their doors.

A new bill, passed by the Texas State Legislature in May and signed into law by Gov. Greg Abbott in June, has the potential to be even more disruptive. Instead of outlawing abortion outright, the new law empowers private citizens to sue doctors like Kumar, nurses, members of his staff, as well as anyone else who “aids and abets” an abortion — family members who drive patients to the clinic, faith leaders who provide counseling, abortion funds — for $10,000 each. The ban applies to abortions that take place after heart activity can be detected in the embryo — six weeks gestation, or roughly two weeks after a woman’s missed period, when many women don’t even know they are pregnant yet.

continued: https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/sb-8-texas-abortion-law-10000-dollar-bounty-1194953/