Abortion bans and restrictions have numerous downstream effects on health care. For instance, medical students in states where those laws exist will not receive training for some standard procedures.
Human embryos are far more likely to die than come to term, an evolutionary trait seen across species. Laws granting personhood at conception ignore built-in embryo loss, with potentially grave consequences.
Two poems that were originally excised from ‘Ariel,’ Plath’s seminal poetry collection, vividly channel the painful experience of losing an unborn child.
The graffiti on the building reads, ‘The rich abort, the poor die.’
(Megan Rivers-Moore)
As debates about abortion heat up in the U.S. once again, we need to pay attention to the hard-fought struggles over abortion in other nations where religion plays a key role in politics and public life.
Michelle Wise, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau
COVID vaccines have no effect on fertility, do not impact the chance of a miscarriage, and are safe and effective while pregnant. Here’s what the science shows.
During pregnancy, the body’s specialized immune cells must learn to recognize the fetus as part of the self so that they don’t attack it.
Raja Segar via Wikimedia Commons
Eva Gillis-Buck, University of California, San Francisco; James Gardner, University of California, San Francisco et Tippi MacKenzie, University of California, San Francisco
How the immune system learns not to attack a developing fetus and placenta is important to understanding pregnancy and its common complications, like miscarriage.
The physical and psychological symptoms experienced during and after pregnancy loss can be profound, including trauma, heavy blood loss, fatigue, poor concentration and severe abdominal cramping. Workplaces need to treat pregnancy loss seriously.
(Shutterstock)
Research shows women who have experienced miscarriage are at twice the risk of experiencing depression and anxiety and four times the risk of suicide. That’s why workplaces need to step up.
Feelings of guilt often compound the grief that follows miscarriage.
fizkes/iStock via Getty Images Plus
Miscarriage occurs in 15% to 25% of diagnosed pregnancies, bringing heartache to millions of women, many of whom blame themselves. In most cases, however, miscarriage is due to random genetic errors.
Members of a Salvadoran feminist group watch a virtual hearing March 10 on El Salvador’s abortion laws by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights.
Marvin Recinos/AFP via Getty Images
Hundreds of Salvadoran women have been prosecuted for homicide for having abortions, miscarriages or stillbirths since 1997. Now an international court must decide: Is that legal?
In this November 2019 photo, Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex, stands beside her husband at a Remembrance Day ceremony. She’s among high-profile women to go public with her miscarriage.
(AP Photo/Matt Dunham)
Employees who have suffered a miscarriage or stillbirth are more likely to quit their jobs and suffer from impaired work performance. Pregnancy loss is not just a personal issue, but a workplace issue.
‘Catching a baby’ or caring for new parents on Christmas Day is special, midwives say. But Christmas can also be a vulnerable time for many women, especially so during a pandemic.
A pregnant woman walks past a street mural in Hong Kong on March 23, 2020. With the coronavirus pandemic moving quickly, pregnant women are facing a changing health care system.
Anthony Wallace/AFP via Getty Images
Women aged over 35 are sometimes offered genetic testing of their IVF embryos to rule out abnormalities. But it’s expensive and doesn’t increase their chance of a baby. In fact, it could reduce it.
Having an embryo with too many or too few chromosomes is the most common reason for a miscarriage.
From shutterstock.com
Miscarriages are more common than many people realise and can be devastating. Here’s what we know about why they happen, what we can do to treat the causes, and what we could do better.