The curation of this special collection of previously published Sexual and Reproductive Health Matters (SRHM) articles on abortion is particularly relevant in this moment.
It has been 30 years since the world recognised that reproductive rights are human rights. And yet, while sexual and reproductive health has seen significant improvements, gains in access to safe abortion remain tenuous at best — continuing to be subject to backlash, depending on the changing political situation of any given country. As SRHM launches this special collection, Donald Trump has recently won the 2024 US presidential election. Based on his stated positions, this is potentially catastrophic for the reproductive health and rights of women and other marginalised groups, both nationally and internationally, and we are reminded of the fragility of hard-fought gains for sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR).
It is in this context of political volatility, of uncertainty but also possibility, that we offer this special collection. The papers included in the collection are divided by themes.
WATCH THE REGIONAL LAUNCH EVENTS OF THIS COLLECTION
EDITORIAL: The continuing fight for abortion rights: taking stock of the evidence
Eszter Kismödi, Emma Pitchforth, TK Sundari Ravindran, Laura Ferguson, Mindy Jane Roseman, Jane Cottingham & Sapna Desai
EDITORIAL TRANSLATED TO FRENCH: La lutte continue pour le droit à l’avortement : bilan des données disponibles
Eszter Kismödi, Emma Pitchforth, TK Sundari Ravindran, Laura Ferguson, Mindy Jane Roseman, Jane Cottingham & Sapna Desai
Translation by Bouchra Assarag
Politics, laws and policies
From hospital to jail: the impact on women of El Salvador’s total criminalization of abortion (2014)
Citizen’s Coalition for the Decriminalization of Abortion on Grounds of Health, Ethics and Fetal Anomaly, El Salvador
A pronatalist turn in population policies in Iran and its likely adverse impacts on reproductive rights, health and inequality: a critical narrative review (2023)
Asadisarvestani K, Sobotka T
A commentary on the recent ruling by the Thai Constitutional Court in relation to abortion law in Thailand (2020)
Chaturachinda K, Boonthai N
Challenging abortion stigma: framing abortion in Ireland and Poland (2019)
Cullen P, Korolczuk E
Born Unwanted, 35 Years Later: The Prague Study (2006)
David HP
Maintaining Access to Safe Abortion and Reducing Sex Ratio Imbalances in Asia (2008)
Ganatra B
“The health exception”: a means of expanding access to legal abortion (2012)
González Vélez AC
Abortion and Islam: Policies and Practice in the Middle East and North Africa (2007)
Hessini L
Abortion in Poland: politics, progression and regression (2018)
Hussein J, Cottingham J, Nowicka W, Kismodi E
Supreme Court of India judgement on abortion as a fundamental right: breaking new ground (2023)
Jain D
Global impacts of Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization and abortion regression in the United States (2022)
Kaufman R, Brown R, Martínez Coral C, Jacob J, Onyango M, Thomasen K
Abortion Law Reform in Nepal: Women’s Right to Life and Health (2004)
Shakya G, Kishore S, Bird C, Barak J
The misrepresentation of conscientious objection as a new strategy of resistance to abortion decriminalisation (2019)
Undurraga V, Sadler M
Service delivery in diverse contexts
“I would love for there not to be so many hoops … ”: recommendations to improve abortion service access and experiences made by Indigenous women and 2SLGTBQIA+ people in Canada (2023)
Monchalin R, Jubinville D, Pérez Piñán AV, Paul W, Wells M, Ross A, et al.
Analysing the context and characteristics of legal abortion and comprehensive post-abortion care among adolescents aged 10–14 in a network of sentinel centres in Latin America: a retrospective cross-sectional study, 2016–2020 (2023)
Williams CR, Valeria Bahamondes M, Gómez Ponce de León R, da Costa Machado H, Bahamondes L, Caffe S, et al.
The impact of COVID-19 lockdown on abortion care: a time series analysis of data from Marie Stopes Nepal (2022)
Horan C, Palmer M, Shrestha R, Erlank CP, Church K
Protecting safe abortion in humanitarian settings: overcoming legal and policy barriers (2017)
Radhakrishnan A, Sarver E, Shubin G
Uptake of postabortion care services and acceptance of postabortion contraception in Puntland, Somalia (2017)
Chukwumalu K, Gallagher MC, Baunach S, Cannon A
Technological advances
Abortion hotlines around the world: a mixed-methods systematic and descriptive review (2021)
Gill RK, Cleeve A, Lavelanet AF
Lessons learned from developing and implementing digital health tools for self-managed abortion and sexual and reproductive healthcare in Canada, the United States, and Venezuela (2023)
Luigi-Bravo G, Maria Ramirez A, Gerdts C, Gill R
Estimating induced abortion incidence and the use of non-recommended abortion methods and sources in two provinces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (Kinshasa and Kongo Central) in 2021: results from population-based, cross-sectional surveys of reproductive-aged women (2023)
Akilimali P, Moreau C, Byrne M, Kayembe D, Larson E, Bell SO
The association between intimate partner violence and self-managed abortion: a cross-sectional study among women in urban Bangladesh (2022)
Crouthamel B, Dixit A, Pearson E, Menzel J, Paul D, Shakhider MAH, et al.
Women’s experiences
A week in the life of an abortion doctor, Western Cape Province, South Africa (2008)
Alblas M
Stigma and agency: exploring young Kenyan women’s experiences with abortion stigma and individual agency (2018)
Mohamed D, Diamond-Smith N, Njunguru J.
The preventable burden of mortality from unsafe abortion among female sex workers: a Community Knowledge Approach survey among peer networks in eight countries (2023)
Willis B, Church K, Perttu E, Thompson H, Weerasinghe S, Macias-Konstantopoulos W
Stigma and abortion complications: stories from three continents (2019)
Seewald M, Martin LA, Echeverri L, Njunguru J, Hassinger JA, Harris LH
Termination of pregnancy for fetal abnormality: a meta-ethnography of women’s experiences (2014)
Lafarge C, Mitchell K, Fox P
HIV, unwanted pregnancy and abortion – where is the human rights approach? (2012)
de Bruyn M
“Without this program, women can lose their lives”: migrant women’s experiences with the Safe Abortion Referral Programme in Chiang Mai, Thailand (2017)
Tousaw E, La RK, Arnott G, Chinthakanan O, Foster AM