Abortion Care in Wisconsin is Hard to Find in Wisconsin if You Can’t Get Your Oasis In California, And It’s Never Going To Happen In Wisconsin
The researchers compared deaths and other health outcomes between states based on current abortion access policies after the Supreme Court decision this summer to overturn the contraceptives law.
“I have had teenagers with chronic medical conditions that make their pregnancy very high risk and women with highly desired pregnancies who receive a terrible diagnosis of a fetal anomaly cry when they learn that they can’t receive their abortion in our state and beg me to help them,” she told President Biden and members of the White House Task Force on Reproductive Healthcare Access this week.
She said that she can’t help you, since our state’s politicians told her she couldn’t.
While 40 of the clinics in these states are still open for other services, the Guttmacher analysis found 26 clinics had completely closed down, which means they might never reopen.
“These clinics no longer have staff anymore, and they probably moved their medical supplies to other facilities,” Jones says. It’s not like they would be able to open their doors tomorrow, even if the bans were lifted.
“Abortion care is incredibly difficult to get in Wisconsin – you have to leave the state,” explains Elizabeth Nash, a state policy analyst at the Guttmacher Institute, a reproductive health research group that supports abortion rights.
During this week’s White House event, she said that she recently saw a patient in a Southern state with a very serious condition and that it could cause death if not treated correctly. Before coming to Illinois, the patient tried to get health care in her own state.
“We were able to provide the care required for this patient, which was unfortunately more complex than it needed to be because there were several weeks that ensued before the patient sought care and eventually saw us,” Haider said.
Proposal for an Abortion Ban in Michigan: Is It Already Out Of Patience? Pathsensing the 1931 Law in Michigan’s Birthright Now’
The issue is on the ballot in several more states for this midterm election, including an anti-abortion measure in Montana, and measures in California and Vermont that would explicitly protect abortion rights in those states’ constitutions.
When Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina, proposed a national ban on abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy, the bill sparked controversy across the political spectrum. There was no mention about the impact on the number of women who were having children in their 30s.
The proposed ban would allow exceptions to save a woman’s life and for some pregnancies resulting from rape and incest, but it notably lacks exceptions for fetal abnormalities. With this in mind, it would make it much harder for older women with long- delayed births to get pregnant and thus give them greater risk of Down syndrome.
Some anatomical anomalies, too, cannot be diagnosed until later in pregnancy. Older mothers are also more likely to enter pregnancy with health conditions that can worsen as gestation progresses and can require termination to save the woman’s life or prevent disability.
The 1931 law has been blocked by courts. The uncertainty surrounding the appeals and judicial wranglings is making it difficult for abortion providers in Michigan.
Those of us who are wearied by the political battles in the trenches have moments of hope, hidden in grief, that help us stand up. The public’s support and our colleagues in other specialties who are stepping up to organize and rally on our behalf and the American Medical Association that are not in favor of abortion bans have put our sails into the air.
I am worried about my patients and providers. I think about how scared my patients must be traveling to another state, how quickly their finances are drained, how alone they must feel. I worry the hospital will think I didn’t do enough for them, since they can hear the cracks in my voice when I tell them.
I worry that the next lawyer I discuss with will not understand the complex case and that the patient who needs an abortion will be denied. I worry they will lack the time, money, transportation, and support to get the care they need. They will forever change their life because of the denial, which is not in accord with my opinion or the patient’s wishes. I am scared they will die.
Many physicians have more than one job. I work at a clinic that provides abortion care to everyone, not just patients with afetal issues. Their lives are not easy, either.
A Michigan woman was pregnant with her second child at 11 weeks. Nearly 90% of abortions performed in Michigan are done within the first 13 weeks of pregnancy — and more than half are medication abortions.
What is wrong with abortion in Europe: telemedicine and the tragic loss of a precious baby in Greece, a perspective from Cutler
In Wisconsin, Cutler says she’s seeing similar problems unfold. “There are delays in care due to physicians being hesitant, thinking twice and calling legal counsel to make sure, where the direction from a medical perspective seems clear, but is it legal?”
Every time I am forced to turn a patient away, that burning candle inside me, once a roaring and passionate fire in a young student excited to embark upon a career of helping others, dims ever so slightly. Even if I am powerless to do anything about this serious mistake of my duty as a physician, it is hard to recover from.
I still have joy in my job. The trembling hands of a college student, suddenly still after swallowing the first pill of their medication abortion regimen, whispering with increasing confidence, “I’m going to be ok.” When a transplant recipient knows she won’t have to go back on the transplant list, the tears stop.
The enormous weight on the shoulders of a single mom lifts, now that she can focus on the family she has and the career she wants, free of the constraints of an unwanted pregnancy. I take some comfort from knowing that the shattered hearts of Tara and Justin – who desperately wanted the baby they had to say goodbye to – can finally start to heal now, knowing they did what was right for Tara’s health and spared their baby, who could not have lived, a short lifetime of pain.
Providing abortion pills via telemedicine, across state lines, raises legal questions. The Dutch physician Dr. Rebecca Gomperts, the founder of Aid Access, writes prescriptions for abortion pills for women in red states, using her Austrian medical license. I wrote a story for The New York Times Magazine that talked about how American doctors and other healthcare providers are using their influence with the Greek people to help them. “I just want to scream, ‘This is a public health emergency!’” one of the doctors, Linda Prine, texted me while I was reporting. Abortion opponents, on the other hand, say their state laws should bind out-of-state providers.
Patients should be allowed to make medical decisions that are in alignment with their faith, family needs and their health without interference from the government. They should be able to get compassionate care no matter what state they live in. Doctors should be able to just be doctors. I should be allowed to care for my patients without fear of retaliation or legal jeopardy.
In a new report from the Commonwealth Fund, it was stated that women of reproductive age and birthing people in states with current or proposed abortion bans have more limited access to affordable health insurance, worse health outcomes, and lower access to maternity care providers.
More women are traveling to other states for abortions in clinics in Colorado, Illinois and New York. But the shift to telemedicine makes sense for practical reasons. Having an abortion in the house, which uses pills, is just as safe and effective as an abortion at a clinic.
Voting over the Dobbs decision: Protesters of Anti-Abortion Laws in Michigan and the Electoral Race in Michigan
The question for Democrats who are in a historically unfavorable position as the party in charge of the White House, and facing growing concerns about inflation and the rest of the economy, is to what degree the energy unleashed by this Summer’s Supreme Court decision.
Republicans, meanwhile, are primarily focusing on voters’ concerns about the economy, inflation, and crime. They are trying to distance themselves from some of the most severe abortion restrictions that came into effect during the summer.
In August, supporters of abortion rights won a major victory in Kansas when voters soundly rejected a ballot initiative that would have said that the state constitution does not include protections for abortion rights. But that was just about six weeks after the Dobbs decision was released.
There will be a lot of attention on the governor’s race in Michigan, where Democratic governors have fought efforts to impose restrictive abortion laws.
The Women’s Health Protection Act is being pushed by abortion rights supporters as a way to codify protections in federal law. That legislation passed the House last year in a largely symbolic vote but has lacked the votes to overcome the Senate filibuster.
The vice president of government affairs at SBA Pro-Life America said that if there was no ban on abortions, people would continue to travel to states with more liberal abortion laws.
President Biden has promised he would veto any such anti-abortion legislation that might pass while he’s in office, but NARAL Pro-Choice America President Mini Timmaraju said that would be too close for comfort.
Timmaraju, Butler, and Other Anti-Abortion Rights Candidates: The Case Against Abortion at a Crisis Pregnancy Center
“We certainly don’t want to let it get that far. That’s a bad precedent,” Timmaraju said. We’re not going to let it reach that point; that’s our goal.
Butler, of Emily’s List, said she is hopeful abortion rights will be top of mind for voters in what many political observers are suggesting may be a difficult midterm for Democrats.
“Voters carry their whole selves into the ballot box and that’s how they’re part of the total person,” he said. “And what we have experienced as a nation is that our economy ebbs and flows – but once our fundamental freedoms are taken away, we don’t know if we’re ever going to be able to get that back.”
To that end, a coalition of national abortion rights groups is spending $150 million toward this campaign season, along with hundreds of millions more in abortion-focused ads from Democratic candidates themselves.
Meanwhile, SBA Pro-Life America’s Musgrave says the group’s Women Speak Out Pac has contacted some 8 million voters nationwide on behalf of anti-abortion rights candidates and related ballot measures.
Melissa had ended up at a crisis pregnancy center. Such centers are usually religious, and most aren’t licensed medical clinics, though their advertising can be misleading. Their primary goal is to convince people not to get an abortion.
NPR agreed to not to use full names for all the patients interviewed in this story because of the intimate medical information discussed concerning a highly politicized and controversial issue.
The First Congress of the Michigan Abortion Proposal – Tonight’s Senate Majority Whiff vote – on an abortion ban in Michigan
The waiting room of the Northland is pretty and welcoming. Big windows look out on tall pines bending in the breeze. The TV is set to the cheerful chatter of women remodeling their modern farmhouses on HGTV.
“‘You can never tell anyone, because no man will ever marry you if he knows that this has happened,’” Chelian recalled her father telling her afterward. You’re going to be fine. We’re going to take care of you. After this conversation, we’ll never discuss it again.’”
Ultimately, if abortion is going to stay legal in Michigan, it could come down to this election. Proposal 3 would make it clear in the state’s constitution that the right to abortion is a fundamental right.
On August 1 the courts ruled that it was legal to have an abortion at breakfast and lunch, but again at dinner.
Hummingbird: A Case Study in Michigan Abortion Legal Ballot Clinics with a High-Energy Drifter
Northland’s founder Chelian, now 71, is like a hummingbird: a petite powerhouse who never stops moving. She has spent most of her life creating the clinics she could have had when she was a teenager, such as spaces that are clean but not dull, and where soothing music plays in the procedure rooms. After their appointments, patients receive a brown paper bag with their prescriptions inside, and their names and a small heart drawn in pink marker on the front.
The appointment turned out to be an unforeseen turn. ” She wanted to be with me when I was sick or tired,” she says. “She gave me a Bible. It didn’t seem to be religion until the very end. They were posing to be pro-choice, but they are not.
“I’m in this weird situation of, I’m going through a divorce, and I slept with somebody one time. And then I got pregnant. Are you sure that you don’t see a future with this guy? What if we brought him in here?’ They’re trying to get me to have a baby that I cannot have and then they’re trying to get me into a relationship. It’s crazy.
She says that she feels better because she has two kids, a two-year-old and a 10-year-old. It shouldn’t be that hard.
Source: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2022/11/07/1131353552/michigan-abortion-legal-ballot-clinic
Seeing and Hearing: How Do We Live, What Has Happened Since Prop. 3? And What Do We Want to Do About It?
When she gets her name called, a staff member brings her from the waiting area into the procedure rooms where she will meet the doctor who will perform her procedure: an obstetrician-gynecologist.
Lance, like many of the patients here, has kids and the experiences of living with a toddler give most of the small talk before the procedure begins.
Earlier this year, Lance was dyeing the tips of her short brown hair purple — it helps nervous young patients relax when she walks in and they see their abortion doctor is actually a woman with cool purple hair.
Every little moment of connection and ease is important, given how public, politicized and ugly the legal fights over abortion have become, Lance says. “It has been a tough few months ever since the Dobbs decision.”
There was a new thing happening that was affecting how we could work, or whether we could work and if we could continue to provide care.
She’s optimistic that Prop. 3 will pass, and do away with any threat from the 1931 ban. “I am hopeful. But…” she sighs, then pauses. “I think you just have to be. How could I go to work if I weren’t there?
Source: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2022/11/07/1131353552/michigan-abortion-legal-ballot-clinic
When moms come to Northland, “I don’t want to be like a prisoner,” she tells a mother of two girls
Northland’s clinic in Sterling Heights sees about 22 to 24 patients a day. On the nine days a public radio reporter visited, about half of the patients agreed to an interview or allowed the reporter to accompany them during the office visit or surgical procedure.
A. is a slender, energetic mom with big, bright eyes. She’s quick to cut through any tension with a joke. But she dissolves into tears when asked about why she came to Northland.
“I don’t think I could survive if I knew that I had to have these babies with an abusive person,” A. says. “That’s insanity to me. I feel like a prisoner.”
A. has two toddler girls, and her former partner was violent. She fled and was trying to get a personal protection order when she discovered that she was pregnant with twins.
Source: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2022/11/07/1131353552/michigan-abortion-legal-ballot-clinic
“I’m like a Grinch: my heart’s getting bigger,” she tells the woman who is trying to get rid of sex
I have begged and asked them to do whatever it is they have to do. She cried as she said that they deny her. I end up on medication for birth control. It’s insanity.”
“And I’m so fertile that it’s like, literally, I just, I have to stop having sex in order not to be pregnant. I’m happy that this is my first abortion and I don’t know what to do with it.
After a moment, A. wipes the tears off her face. She manages to smile. It’s more sharing than it has been in the last ten years. I’m like the Grinch: my heart’s getting bigger.”
Source: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2022/11/07/1131353552/michigan-abortion-legal-ballot-clinic
Identifying an abortion patient at Northland, Michigan: A story about a mom and a woman in a legal balance-clinic setting
A. is what you might imagine when you think about why someone would need an abortion: An abusive relationship. Money problems. Emotional distress. There are a lot of that at Northland.
You see patients with great relationships, they’re financially stable, and emotionally composed. M. requested to be identified only by her first initial.
“I want to go back to work and just kind of have something for myself other than just be a mother all day, every day,” she says, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.
The youngest of M.’s three kids is about to start school. After ten years of staying at home with her children, M. felt like she was on the cusp of something new.
The pills for medication abortions are prescribed in the morning and then taken care of in the afternoon.
Lance told one patient that he would set them up on a table and then the reporter could observe and record their procedure, but she said that she did not want to be identified.
Once the procedure is complete, the lights are turned off and music plays. The patient is wearing a medical gown with her bare legs stirrups, a staffer holds her hand and helps her through it.
Source: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2022/11/07/1131353552/michigan-abortion-legal-ballot-clinic
The Night Before An Abortion: How My Mom and I Came to Northland, and I’m glad I didn’t
It’s typical for patients to be partially awake during first trimester abortions. Pain and anxiety medications are given to every patient by Northland Family Planning.
Sitting in the waiting area, this patient talked about how hard the journey to Northland had been. How she hid it from her mom at first, until her aunties threatened to tell her mom if she didn’t do it herself. How her mom was surprisingly supportive, getting up early with her that morning, and making sure she ate a good breakfast before her appointment.
She didn’t want to be stuck with the man who got her pregnant. She asked him if he could help her pay for this abortion. He said that the most he could do was split it.
“The guys, they’re never held responsible for things like this, ever,” she says. “It’s always the woman.” We always got to step up and take care of it. Whether we keep it or not, it’s always put in our lap.”
It can’t touch you. It could touch you in so many ways. It could be your mom. It could be your sister. It could be your niece. It could be your daughter. Your daughter, your future child. Your future wife is your future partner. Don’t think it won’t impact you, man or woman.
The moment Kristen Petranek realised abortion had become illegal in Wisconsin – she was terrified. And then she realized she had to go home
The moment Kristen Petranek knew she would stop trying to get pregnant came in May, while lying on her couch in Madison, Wisconsin. That’s when she saw the news pop up on her phone about a leaked Supreme Court draft opinion overturning Roe v. Wade.
Petranek, 31, and her husband Daniel have two children – a 7-year-old son and 4-year-old daughter. Her pregnancies had been hard on her body, she says, and risky, because she is diabetic. She and her husband wanted to have three kids. “I have three brothers and he has one brother – we kind of liked [a number] in the middle of that,” she says.
Devastated, she went home to wait for the miscarriage to resolve. It was the second time she had made a mistake. She was worried about possible problems. The days passed miserably, she says, as she suffered through nausea, extreme fatigue, abdominal pain and backaches. After a few days, she started to run a fever.
Since Roe v. Wade was overturned, news reports and affidavits have shown how this is happening around the country, including NPR’s story about a woman who was sent home from an Ohio ER hemorrhaging from a miscarriage.
Resting under a heating pad, she tried to distract herself from the miscarriage by scrolling through Twitter, and that’s when she saw the leaked Supreme Court opinion indicating that Roe v. Wade could imminently be overturned.
She knew what that would mean in Wisconsin – an old law on the books could snap back into place, making abortions illegal. Petranek was focused on growing her family and wouldn’t end her pregnancy. She realized immediately that if abortion became illegal, doctors would care for her differently if something went wrong.
Pregnant patients with diabetes, like Petranek, have elevated risks of birth defects, preterm birth, preeclampsia and more. She says that even though her diabetes is well managed, it’s always a risk. And in places that ban abortion, care for complications can be more difficult to access if doctors and nurses are nervous about being accused of violating the law.
One woman had to go out of state for care because her waters broke too early, and the other had to wait until she was showing more signs of an illness. According to the survey, one hospital no longer treated ectopic pregnancies even if they were life threatening, because they were no longer considered viable.
Source: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2022/12/09/1141404068/wisconsin-abortion-law-pregnancy-risk-miscarriage
The Wisconsin abortion law and risks a miscarriage: Alicia Petranek says it will be overturned in a special session
“That was the moment I knew I couldn’t try again,” she says. “It wasn’t even a conscious decision, it was just like – I will not put myself through that again if I don’t have the confidence that I will be able to come out the other side.”
During her first miscarriage years ago, Petranek ended up in the E.R. Doctors gave her a dilation and curettage, or D&C, procedure to stop the bleeding – the same procedure that’s used for many abortions.
Her pregnancies have been mentally and physically draining, and she says it’s kind of like she’s going to fall apart.
She says that there is “misinformation” that could affect treatment for miscarriages. “When we’re talking about an ectopic pregnancy, a miscarriage – these are in no way, shape or form an abortion,” she says.
The 1849 ban was being sued by Democratic Governor Tony Evers. But the Republican-controlled legislature has made it clear it wants it to remain in place, and rejected the governor’s call to overturn it in a special session in June. Assembly Speaker Robin Vos and Senate Leaders Devin LeMahieu and Chris Kapenga – all Republicans – declined NPR’s requests for an interview for this story.
Three doctors from Wisconsin have joined the lawsuit. The law and the fear of prosecution have already impacted their medical decision making and their “ability to provide necessary and appropriate care in Wisconsin.”
Source: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2022/12/09/1141404068/wisconsin-abortion-law-pregnancy-risk-miscarriage
What Happens When You’re Pregnant: The Impacts of State Laws and the Laws of Birth on Miscarriage
What’s at stake: Decisions about how many children to have, when to start trying, how close in age children should be spaced – are usually not made by individuals alone, explains Dr. Abigail Cutler, an obstetrician-gynecologist and professor at the University of Wisconsin’s medical school.
decisions are sometimes made with other people, such as romantic relationships, family, friends, and faith leaders. Now, after the overturning of Roe v. Wade, she says a new element must be added to that calculus: the state laws where people live, and whether they have access to comprehensive care during pregnancy.
How people process risks varies. “A single mom [with] four kids at home – their tolerance for incurring even the smallest amount of risk that could be associated with even just a healthy pregnancy is going to be potentially lower than someone who really desperately wants to become pregnant and is really willing to do whatever it takes in order to have a child.”
Meanwhile, researchers are trying to measure the many different effects of abortion restrictions – such as how many additional babies will be born, how many people will cross state lines for care, and more.
She says that the intentions of a pregnant woman are nuanced. “There are people who are really desperate to get pregnant, there are people who are really desperate to not be pregnant, and most people are somewhere in between,” she explains, and it’s a challenge to capture that nuance in data.
Anti-abortion groups dispute that state abortion bans like Wisconsin’s can impinge on pregnancy care. Gracie Skogman, legislative director for Wisconsin Right to Life, says “it’s heartbreaking to hear of any woman who feels that she would not be able to have care for miscarriage.”
Source: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2022/12/09/1141404068/wisconsin-abortion-law-pregnancy-risk-miscarriage
Pregap and birth: A woman’s perspective on a time when women had limited rights and had no right to have a child: Petranek reflects through tears
Cutler says that the concern Petranek feels about potentially not being able to get timely or appropriate care during a pregnancy complication could be very real.
She says that it was written only by men at a time when C-sections and labor were not done without anesthesia and problems of pregnancy and labor were not understood. The 1850s was a time in which women had limited rights and were second class citizens.
The patient’s perspective is that they are currently using condoms for contraception, but will look into longer-term options like a vasectomy for their husband or IUD for themselves.
Petranek isn’t happy about the decision, but she is steadfast in her determination. She would have had a baby over Thanksgiving this year if she hadn’t miscarried. “It was good that I had the distraction of the holiday but I kept thinking, ‘I would have been holding a newborn right now,’” she says.
She says that she ponders every day the loss of the baby and the chance to expand her family in the future. She says they wanted a third child, and through tears.
And she says, she finds herself looking at her 4-year-old daughter in a new way. “I have to reconcile with the fact that she’s truly, always going to be my youngest child now, when I always pictured her as a big sister someday.”
Source: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2022/12/09/1141404068/wisconsin-abortion-law-pregnancy-risk-miscarriage
Reproductive Health Care: Why Does Medicaid Have An Increased Rate for Women in the United States? A Study by a Doctor at the University of Maryland
If people that favor abortion restrictions understand the impact on people who face situations, then they will be in favor of it. She says that she is a Presbyterian and goes to the church every Sunday.
The report showed that the death rates for women of reproductive age were 34% higher in abortion-restriction states than in abortion-access states.
States that only have one abortion clinic are similar to states that only have one or few labor and delivery units because their facilities will become swamped with patients and that may cause delays in care. This is not the way healthcare should be. People should have access to all reproductive health care services regardless of zip code.
Separate research published in 2020 in the journal Women’s Health Issues found that although maternal mortality overall continues to increase in the United States, the maternal death rate in states that have expanded Medicaid has had less of an increase than in non-expansion states.
Dr. Kristyn Brandi, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists’ Darney-Landy Fellow, said she is not surprised by the findings in the new report because the “issues around reproductive health care are intricately linked.”