The Guardian: How Republicans pass abortion bans
UC faculty cited as expert in national media coverage of Ohio abortion access and laws
An article in "The Guardian" contends there is a vast difference in how Ohio voters view abortion rights and what laws are being passed, due to gerrymandering in Republican legislative districts.
In Ohio and elsewhere, the article states that politicians are protected by their ability to draw their own political districts every 10 years, distorting them in such a way as to virtually guarantee their re-election and that these legislators will restrict abortion access.
As the supreme court weighs overturning Roe v Wade, one study cited in the article predicts that a complete ban on abortion in the state could increase the average distance a woman has to travel in Ohio to an abortion clinic from an average of 26 miles to as much as 269 miles.
Such a ban would mean that those seeking an abortion will have to pay “exorbitant amounts of income” to travel to obtain an abortion out of state, said Danielle Bessett, a University of Cincinnati associate professor of sociology who studies abortion access. “People who are not gonna be able to afford that travel … are then going to try and self-source abortion care at home. And we’ll probably see lots of inequality in how people are prosecuted and arrested for that,” she said.
Those who don’t try either of those and are forced to carry their pregnancy to term. “There are equity issues there, too, with Black women having the highest rate of maternal mortality,” Bessett said.
Bessett is also a UC Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies faculty affiliate and teaches courses on medicine, family, and reproduction.
Featured image of medical clinic courtesty of Unsplash.
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