The Supreme Court just blocked one of the hundreds of abortion restrictions introduced over the past year. So what do these news laws signal about the future of reproductive rights in the US?
Demonstrators in support of abortion and contraceptive rights.
REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst
The Supreme Court let stand a lower court ruling against mandatory ultrasounds for women seeking abortions, but the court leaves in place major—and growing—restrictions on women’s health policies.
The risk of a woman dying from a road accident is approximately 25 times that of death from a pill-related clot.
epSos .de/Flickr
Newer contraceptive pills pose a higher risk of serious blood clots, says a study published in the BMJ today. The finding isn’t new, but it may be cause for a different kind of concern.
Peter Robinson is aiming for influence.
Niall Carson/PA
Northern Ireland’s biggest party could be a kingmaker in the 2015 Westminster election. And keeping tight control over abortion could be a condition of support.
Belfast bakery or political hot potato?
Brian Lawless/PA
After 35 years of consistently strict government control over family size, China’s so-called “one child policy” seems to be winding down – at least for some. Recent headlines quote the authorities in Shanghai…
Opposing this law change is not anti-feminist.
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A campaign is underway in the UK to make it illegal to abort a child based on its gender. Proponents say they are worried about women being coerced into terminating female foetuses and that action needs…
Protesters in front of the Supreme Court in January 2011.
Jim Young/Reuters
Carole Joffe, University of California, San Francisco
On the first day of the new Congress in January, anti-abortion legislators in the House introduced the Pain Capable Unborn Child Protection Act. The bill would have banned abortions after 20 weeks, except…
The consequences of fetal personhood on women’s rights in pregnancy and childbirth, and for abortion, are uncertain.
SIOBHAN MARREN/AAP
A bill due to be debated in the upper house of the NSW Parliament will bestow legal personhood to fetuses of 20 weeks or more for the purpose of grievous bodily harm offences in the Crimes Act, if passed…
Abortion isn’t just a plot device in Obvious Child.
Chris Teague
The recently released Obvious Child has been dubbed the first “abortion rom-com”. Donna, played by Jenny Slate, is a 20-something Brooklyn comedian pregnant after a post-breakup one-night-stand. She even…
Research that found links between abortion and breast cancer also found men who had ‘much opportunity to participate in parties’ were more likely to have stomach cancer.
burningmax/Flickr
The purported link between abortion and breast cancer is based on research that’s no longer accepted as valid because its methods are so flawed. But that hasn’t stopped politicians such as Fred Nile and…
Pro-choice campaigners make their feelings known at a protest in 2013.
Niall Carson/Press Association Images
The high-profile case of a young woman forced to give birth in Ireland has highlighted the realities of Ireland’s recently introduced Protection of Life During Pregnancy Act 2013 – a law designed to regulate…
Not wilful but still worrying.
Stethoscope by Shutterstock
In May, the Department of Health circulated a series of abortion-related publications including an awkwardly titled report highlighting historic medical practices, regulation and the role of the state…
In the European Union, the European Citizen’s Initiative was set up with the aim of bringing the activities of the European Parliament closer to the citizens of Europe. If a petition can achieve 1m signatures…
In 2012 a 15-year-old UK citizen found herself unwillingly pregnant. Had she lived in England, Scotland, or Wales she could have contacted her GP or local sexual health clinic to arrange a termination…
Channel 9’s new series Love Child made its television debut this week. Its storylines are based on the systematic practice of removing babies from young, single mothers from the 1950s to the 1970s in Australia…
Ethical issues are rife in medicine. Arguments about abortion, organ donation and euthanasia regularly take their turn in the headlines, normally prompted by media scare-stories or an arising controversy…
Campaigners outside the Victorian parliament in the run-up to the 2008 reform of state’s abortion law, which is under fire.
AAP Image/Mariza O'Keefe
Abortion in Australia is governed by varied state-based laws. Despite the clear requirement for doctors with conscientious objection not to block access to abortion, this aspect of some state laws has…
The High Court may be forced to decide on the constitutionality of Tasmania’s abortion protest law.
Alex Guibord
Earlier this week, constitutional law academic Michael Stokes predicted the High Court of Australia would overturn new Tasmanian legislation banning anti-abortion lobbyists from protesting within 150 metres…