'What ends today ... is LEGAL abortion': U.S. court ruling on abortion slammed

Elianna Lev
·5 min read
'What ends today ... is LEGAL abortion': U.S. court ruling on abortion slammed

Friday’s news that the Supreme Court of the United States had overturned the Roe vs Wade abortion ruling has sent a shockwave to millions of people in that country and aboard.

The decision no longer secures constitutional protection for abortion, by allowing each state to restrict or ban access to the procedure.

Dr. Christabelle Sethna, a professor with the Institute of Feminist and Gender Studies at the University of Ottawa, says what’s happening now is going to have all kinds of repercussions, including in Canada.

“What’s now going to happen is things like miscarriage or difficult pregnancies, there will be a tendency to criminalize these types of pregnancies,” she tells Yahoo Canada News. “Certain states already have on the books state laws that make it difficult to get an abortion at the earliest stages. These states are now free to put these extremely restrictive laws in place.”

She says that what people don’t often realize is that pregnancy can be dangerous for women and not all women can have a successful pregnancy.

“We know that women have many different health conditions, lots of things can go wrong and maternal mortality is a major issue throughout the world, particularly for women who are poor and marginalized,” Sethna says.

When it comes to Canadians, Sethna says that some women who have previously gone to the U.S. for late term abortions, depending on where they were available, might now face restrictions. She adds that it is likely Americans will cross the border to access our health services.

“We might see a flow of women from the U.S. coming to Canada for abortion services,” Sethna says. “What will that mean for the medical system in Canada? Some of the states might criminalize women who cross borders for abortions. What does that mean for women?”

Sethna stresses that the younger generations are going to experience this overturning in a very powerful way.

“The women of reproductive age really need to think about what their strategies are going to be,” she says. “Contraception is never fool proof and not every woman has a perfect pregnancy and not every woman gets pregnant at a point in her life where she can manage the pregnancy, the childbirth and the raising of the child for the next 20 years.”

On Twitter, reaction to the subject was frenzied and included the voices from many leaders, including Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and U.S. President Joe Biden.

Thousands across the world are sharing their grief and anger at the decision. Canadians are even offering help to women in the United States.