Abortion bans can cause clinics to close and put other health care at risk

Baby Absection in the State of Texas, and Implications for the Legal and Political Climate in Adoption Laws and States with Abortion Restriction

Women are joining a lawsuit against the state of Texas because they say the state’s abortion ban puts their health and lives at risk.

“What happened to these women is indefensible and is happening to countless pregnant people across the state,” Molly Duane, an attorney with the Center for Reproductive Rights, said in a statement.

Another Texas law, known as S.B. 8, prohibits nearly all abortions after about six weeks of pregnancy. The ban took effect in September 2021., after the Supreme Court turned back a challenge from a Texas abortion provider.

In an interview with NPR in April, Jonathan Mitchell, a lawyer who assisted Texas lawmakers in crafting the language behind S.B. 8, said he believed the medical exceptions in the law should not have prohibited emergency abortions.

The rush in conservative states to ban abortion after the overturn of Roe v. Wade is resulting in a startling consequence that abortion opponents may not have considered: fewer medical services available for all women living in those states.

An early indication of that impending medical “brain drain” came in February, when 76% of respondents in a survey of more than 2,000 current and future physicians say they would not even apply to work or train in states with abortion restrictions. In an accompanying article the study’s authors wrote, “Many qualified candidates would no longer consider working or training in more than half of the U.S.”

There are fewer doctors performing Pap smears and screenings for sexually transmitted diseases that can lead to infertility.

In March, Bonner General Health, the only hospital in Sandpoint, Idaho, announced it would discontinue its labor and delivery services, in part because of “Idaho’s legal and political climate” that includes state legislators continuing to “introduce and pass bills that criminalize physicians for medical care nationally recognized as the standard of care.”

The study found that doctors who perform abortions in states that ban the procedure are less likely to perform the same procedure in states that let abortion be performed for women at any point in their pregnancies.

Women who know their pregnancies could become high-risk are thinking twice about getting or being pregnant in states with abortion restrictions. The woman who chronicled her difficulties getting care for a miscarriage in a series of videos on TikTok said she would not try to get pregnant again.

The anti- abortion movement used to be sensitive to the idea that its policies do not benefit women and children. The late Rep. Henry Hyde was one of the founding members of the anti-abortion movement.

Few anti-abortion groups are following that example by pushing policies to make it easier for people to get pregnant, give birth, and raise children. Most of those efforts are flying under the radar.

This year, Americans United for Life and Democrats for Life of America put out a joint position paper urging policymakers to “make birth free.” Among their suggestions are automatic insurance coverage, without deductibles or copays, for pregnancy and childbirth; eliminating payment incentives for cesarean sections and in-hospital deliveries; and a “monthly maternal stipend” for the first two years of a child’s life.

In a year when Republicans who support a national abortion ban are pushing for large federal budget cuts, a make-birth-free policy is probably not going to be advanced very quickly.

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