As a woman who would need an abortion if I did get pregnant due to my past pregnancies and adhesions from my pregnancies, there are states that I will never enter. What we need to do as women, and the few men who take action to support women, is to band together to help women in these states with abortion bans get access to healthcare and to get them out of these states all together. No woman is safe in a state that would force her to give birth. We need programs to help relocate, move, and find jobs for women in states that protect a woman’s choice, her rights, and her body. In many ways, the states with abortion bans have other policies to punish women.
Map provided by reproductive rights.org showing the states with bans and limited abortion access
Many of the states with abortion bans are attempting to eliminate no fault divorce so that women are trapped in unsafe or unhappy marriages. I urge women in these states to find birth control that works for their body’s, though we all know birth control is fallible which is why abortions are needed because of failed birth control. Many of these states with abortion bans are also attacking birth control and influencers are trying to classify birth control as harmful to a woman’s body, it is not and it is needed especially now. Take the pill. Take the shot. Get a hormonal IUD (I have one). Get the implant. Get the ring. Find what works for your body and take it. Heck, take multiple to protect yourself. The most important thing is that a woman finds the right birth control for her body and needs.
This is an all out war on women. My instant reaction is to protect these women in these states. I can’t imagine how horrible it is to live there. I had a friend who lives in Idaho and she had her fourth baby there. She described the healthcare that she received there versus in California as subpar and inhumane. She had one ultrasound and was having complications but the doctor would not even listen to her. This was before the abortion ban came in to effect in Idaho. Everything she described about the state and the people were the precursors to all the draconian laws against women and the environment.
These women in these states that want out need a lifeline to help them out, not just with abortions, but to relocate out of these states because they will not just stop at abortions, but they are seeking to limit all of women’s rights. Doctors do not want to practice in these states out of fear that they will face litigation or even jail for assisting in miscarriages and complications associated with pregnancy. Without Obstetricians and Gynecologists in the states that have abortion bans, women cannot receive proper medical care, but the state and local governments do not care about the impact on women and healthcare professionals. This is all about control and they are winning while women are suffering, which is just what they want.
Women face a 15 times higher risk of maternal death.
In states with abortion bans, the maternal death rate is twice as high.
Complications are 25 times higher.
Women in states with abortion bans are depressed and anxious, study shows.
While national fertility rates are declining, states like Texas are increasing up 2%.
WOC face the greatest harm due to the bans.
519,981 rapes resulted in 64,565 pregnancies in states with abortion bans.
Given the option to live in these states with bans, women are opting not to move there. Why would any women want to live in a state that would prosecute her over her healthcare choices? It’s not just abortion that plays a role, because women that refuse to move to these states are doing so because they know what is tied to the abortion bans- women have been relegated to a non-entity in these states. This affects not just healthcare, but a woman’s human rights as a whole. Some companies have offered to help their employees relocate out of these states, like Salesforce has done, and that is commendable and should be the minimum for all companies and corporations located in states with abortion bans.
For women and people with the means and ability to travel out of state for an abortion, they are doing just that, but it is extremely difficult for women and people who do not have the financial means to leave their state and find a clinic to perform an abortion. It takes both money and time that a lot of women and people who are pregnant are not able to come up with either.
The men who created these inhumane bans against women were doing so because they claim it is the moral thing to protect the child. Many abortions occur not because of a means of birth control like these men paint it, but because a mother or pregnant person’s life is actually at risk. Doctors don’t know how to treat these women and pregnant people because they could face fines or even jail time, so what happens is these women and pregnant people suffer along with the fetus. Again, this is the intent of these bills, to make women suffer.
States like Missouri are fighting to remove any access for women to reproductive healthcare along with fighting a disturbing battle to force women who are raped to give birth. While the state has not provided any funding to Planned Parenthood and has tried to shut down this crucial healthcare program for women, but were unsuccessful. They were successful in blocking the ability of women to seek an abortion for rape or incest. One congressmen went as far to say that men committing rapes should be killed, but rapists face little time in jail and are often given a slap on the wrist for their crimes. Saying things like “God doesn’t make mistakes,” in regards to women being impregnated in a sexual assault is abhorrent and appalling coming from an elected official and this individual sounds like a man who regularly assaults women.
Texas has a similar abortion ban, which has impacted Hispanic women the most in that state. Counselors have witnessed the dynamics of women forced to carry a child from sexual assault and the ultimate harm it causes the child. Some women can create a healthy relationship and bond, but the majority of women cannot and the child then suffers. Then there are the children born from unwanted pregnancies that grow up knowing that they were never wanted and these pregnancies were not a result of rape or incest, just an accident, and those children also suffer knowing they are unwanted.
While anti-abortion supporters will state these women have an option to give up their babies, these women who are forced to give birth are not opting to give up their babies for adoption. Adoption rates in Texas have not increased since their abortion ban took effect. What social workers do fear is the impending amount of abandonment cases and child neglect cases that will arise and potentially overwhelm child protective services in these states.
Abortion bans are based on states referencing the Bible, which directly defies the separation of church and state. How the Supreme Court could allow for these bans to remain, is a greater issue in the breakdown of the US justice system as a whole. Women should be allowed to make decisions over their own body and not have laws over them based on a religious bias. In regards to healthcare, religion has to remain separate in order for that person’s human rights to be respected.
Women are suffering. Children are suffering. Women are not safe. Children are not safe. Elected officials that supposedly support abortion have done nothing to enshrine abortion rights and are not doing enough to overthrow these bans.
It is up to women to fight for our rights. Follow the example of Ohio and get abortion access on your states ballot. To be clear, even the Democrats who use abortion as a platform have horrendously failed women, which is why this victory in Ohio is so significant. It is up to women to defeat these abortion bans.
Until abortion is legal again, we all need to help women in these states find abortion care in other states and assist with their travel costs. We also need to help women relocate, find jobs, and find safety in the states that have abortion protections.
Articles for reference (please read and share):
Reproductive Rights: Abortion Laws by State
Johns Hopkins: A Year Without Roe
Johns Hopkins: Bans’ Impact on Mental Health
CNBC: Salesforce offers to relocate employees after Texas abortion bill
Guttmacher: The High Toll of US Abortion Bans: Nearly One in Five Patients Now Traveling Out of State for Abortion Care
ABC: Fighting for their lives: Women and the impact of abortion restrictions in post-Roe America
Missouri Independent: Republicans block attempt to add rape, incest, exemption to Missouri’s abortion ban
Texas Tribune: Texas fertility rate increased after abortion restrictions
Adoption Choices of Texas: How Roe v. Wade Changed Adoption in Texas
National Partnership: State Abortion Bans Harm More than 15 Million Women of Color
AP: Ohio voters just passed abortion protections. When and how they take effect is before the courts