Surprising Findings on Access Post-Dobbs

Recorded:
Oct 2024
Speaker
Dr. Diana Greene Foster
Duration
00:01:59
AUDIO CLIP
TRANSCRIPT

Dr. Diana Greene Foster: I’m studying the consequences of the end of Roe. I have a study where we’ve recruited people who were last served before a ban took affect and people who were recruited later, for the two years since, periodically, and we’re adding people all the time. And what gives me hope is how determined and resilient folks were, that we really don’t find very many people who carried to term. There was a lot of rage donation and organizations set to help people cross state lines, to get people information about ordering pills online. The amount of organizing and energy and resources put towards helping people has been phenomenal, and as a result, very few people I think, have fallen through the cracks. Most people are getting their wanted abortions, and we see people traveling hundreds of miles, delaying for more than a week their abortion, travel costs skyrocket, but procedure costs sometimes go down, because there were so many resources put towards helping people get abortion. And I don’t know what will happen with the election. If we can sustain– already the organizations that are helping are experiencing financial hardships. So I don’t know if what we have is sustainable, if we’re in the middle of a shift from travel to mailing people pills, but it is true that in protected access states, access has gone better. The only reason we could do the Turnaway Study pre-Dobbs was that abortion access was not good pre-Dobbs. So, more people are able to be served now post-Dobbs, surprisingly, in protected access states. I don’t think very many people are unable to get abortions in banned states, much fewer than I expected. I thought it would be a quarter of people who wanted abortions would carry to term, and I think the real number is something like 4%.

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