The Post-Roe Surprise: More Abortions

Abortion rates were expected to tank after Roe v. Wade was overturned. Instead, medication abortion became easy to get—and it changed everything.

A person seen from behind slips a folded sheet of paper that reads in part “Medication Abortion Pills” into a United States Postal Service box. Out of focus and partially obscured, a woman with short hair sits on the other side of a table loaded with stacks of paper and shrink-wrapped cases of pills.

Volunteers at an abortion pill provider work around a conference table to pack 500 boxes to be sent to people in all 50 states.Emily Schiffer

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Access to medication abortion in the years since Covid and the fall of Roe v. Wade has completely reshaped the abortion access landscape in America.

“There’s this irony that’s actually happened,” says Dr. Angel Foster, an abortion provider and researcher. “Tragically, 33 to 40 percent of women of reproductive age now have less of a right to an abortion. But access for many people has increased.”

Foster is the founder of the Massachusetts Medication Abortion Access Project, a clinic whose work is one major player in why abortions are up. Massachusetts and almost half the states in the US have passed shield laws that legally protect abortion providers. The one Foster operates under allows her to prescribe abortion pills to patients in states with abortion bans. 

And while the battleground may be shifting as medication abortions grow more common, the war is far from over. 

This week on Reveal, we explore post-Roe America through the eyes of three women with three very different missions: Foster, who offers medication abortions nationwide; a courier who risks arrest to stockpile abortion pills for an uncertain future; and a conservative activist whose life’s work is trying to stop them both.

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It IS free for you and every reader, viewer, and listener to utilize. But it’s not free for our team to make. So, what’s it worth to you? Let us know by making a donation: Make a one-time donation today to support this work. Or make a monthly sustaining donation to help us plan for the future.

Whatever you choose, know that you’re supporting more independent, investigative journalism in a time when we need it most.

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