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They Were Never Going to Stop After Dobbs. We Can Minimize the Harm.

They Were Never Going to Stop After “Dobbs.” We Can Minimize the Harm.

Our collective liberation depends on our continued dedication to caring for each other through these threats and attacks on abortion access.

Signage left by demonstrators outside the US Supreme Court on March 26, 2024.

On Friday, the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit issued a decision in Louisiana v. Food and Drug Administration, mandating that one of the two medications used in the majority of medication abortion care in the United States, mifepristone, must now be dispensed in person. This is the anti-abortion movement’s most recent attempt to push abortion care out of reach for pregnant people, and the implications are severe and nationwide.

The Fifth Circuit’s ruling affects over a quarter of people accessing telehealth abortion in the United States who receive medication abortion care by mail and pick up the pill at the pharmacy. With clinician-guided telehealth abortion care using mifepristone now disrupted, anti-abortion forces have laid bare their true intentions: to create chaos, confusion, and fear for people who are pregnant and trying to access the lifesaving healthcare they need. With an emergency appeal before the US Supreme Court seeking to restore access to abortion pills by mail, I see this attack for what it is: a political game upending and disrupting real lives.

As a board-certified, full-spectrum obstetrician and gynecologist, an abortion provider, and someone who has been caring for patients over the last 25 years, I’ve witnessed the real-life impact that anti-abortion laws and rules fueled by abortion stigma and patriarchal values like the one issued on Friday night have on patients and their families. The harm is not hypothetical. Anti-abortion extremists prey on people needing timely care and resources, hoping that when a headline is published after new rules are issued or laws are passed, pregnant people believe their only available option is to stay pregnant against their wishes and, sometimes, at the expense of their own health and well-being.

I am here to make it clear that this is simply not the case. Pregnant people across the country need to know that there are still options available to access the care they need. For example, although medication abortion care, or abortion care with pills, has been typically administered........

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