Abortion restrictions may create obstacles for legal access, but they do nothing to eliminate the need for life-saving reproductive healthcare. And when there is a lack of licit opportunities to obtain that care, patients find pathways to get it through alternative networks.

For instance, after the U.S. Supreme Court’s Dobbs v. Jackson decision in June 2022 reversed a decades-long precedent protecting the constitutional right to an abortion, social media and online forums were filled with reactions and resources alike. Among these interventions were viral posts circulated offering to host anyone going on a “camping” trip in a state with legally protected reproductive rights. These “camping trip” posts alluded to a willingness to aid and abet individuals traveling for abortions in states with legally-protected access—and they captured the complications and conflicts embedded in these responses to the ruling.

COVID-19 has dealt out a double dose of woe for global maternal health. According to a new report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO), the pandemic saw an increase in maternal deaths and an exacerbation of racial disparities driving this overall morbidity. In addition, childbearing people experienced significant anxiety and depression. 

“The effects of climate change can begin in the womb,” said Sarah Barnes, the Project Director of the Maternal Health Initiative at the Wilson Center at a recent event on the impact of climate change on maternal and newborn health outcomes, hosted by the Wilson Center and UNFPA. It is a connection that “[makes] it imperative that climate change and maternal and newborn health leaders work together to tackle climate change and improve maternal and newborn health outcomes, globally.”

Often cast into the backwaters of U.S. foreign policy, sub-Saharan Africa now looms large as the Biden Administration grapples with a wide range of global challenges. President Biden will soon host the upcoming Africa Leaders’ Summit in Washington, that acknowledges the U.S. government must do much more in Africa in order to advance U.S. interests and global prosperity.

Last April, Eless Limani set out on a long and costly bicycle ride to the Mponela Health Center to get a new supply of birth control pills, her usual contraceptive. The 32-year-old mother was not ready to have a second child.

While a great deal of focus on risks to women’s health just before and after giving birth centers on physical wellbeing, Rebecca Levine, Senior Maternal Health Advisor with the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), observed that we may be missing a key part of the picture.

For six years, the Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights (SRHR) Index has been a tool to hold the United States accountable to the commitments made nearly three decades ago at the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) in Cairo in 1994, where 180 countries developed a human rights framework for global development that explicitly promoted SRHR for women and girls globally.

The 15^th anniversary of World Contraception Day (WCD) on September 26^th was a perfect moment to renew the commitment to increase awareness and knowledge about contraceptive methods. But the availability of safe and effective methods is not enough. Reproductive autonomy, which is defined as “having the power to decide about and control matters associated with contraceptive use, pregnancy, and childbearing,” is also a central tenet of both WCD and the Sustainable Development Goals for 2030. People must be supported in making their own decisions about their sexual and reproductive health, including if and how they become pregnant.