Study: State has high rate of DIY abortion
Such attempts are 3 times more likely in Texas, report finds
AUSTIN — Using home remedies such as herbs, teas and vitamins or a prescription drug obtained from Mexico, Texas women have tried to end their pregnancies on their own three times more often than women in other states, a new study has found.
The Texas Policy Evaluation Project at the University of Texas at Austin found 6.9 percent of 721 patients seeking abortion had tried to end their pregnancies on their own before going to an abortion clinic, compared with 2.2 percent nationally.
“We hear from clients pretty often, ‘If I can’t get money for this, trying it at home is their next step,’ ” said Cristina Parker, a spokeswoman for the Lilith Fund, which offers financial assistance to people who need abortions.
Most women who used misoprostol — a safe pill commonly used in abortion clinics but available without a prescription in Mexico — were successful in ending their pregnancies, the research found. Women who used home remedies found their attempts failed and sought care at an abortion clinic.
Common factors among the 721 women surveyed and 18 interviewed were living in poverty or facing obstacles that led them to believe they had no other option, such as finding the nearest clinic had closed or they could not afford to pay for the procedure. Nearly all said they would have preferred to go to a clinic instead
of ending their pregnancies themselves.
Self-managed abortion could be on the rise as people from states hostile to abortion confront restrictive policies. The nonprofit Guttmacher Institute in New York, which supports abortion rights, found 18 percent of nonhospital clinics across the country reported treating at least one person who had attempted an abortion without a doctor’s help in 2017. That’s up from 12 percent in 2014.
The Texas study suggests self-managed abortions could become more common in Texas if clinics become more difficult to access. Researchers say that could be especially true in South Texas — where women are closer to Mexico and can more readily obtain misoprostol — or among poor women who cannot afford an abortion, which can cost $500 or more.
“If people have to choose a self-managed procedure thinking that what they could be doing is dangerous or that it could compromise their future fertility, and they’re therefore scared and think they have no other options, that’s not health care with dignity,” said Liza Fuentes, senior research scientist at Guttmacher who collaborated with the Texas Policy Evaluation Project on its study.
She said the findings show a need to ensure women who try to end their pregnancies at home have accurate information about effective methods and what to expect.
The research was conducted in 2012 and 2014, before and after a Texas law forced nearly half the state’s abortion clinics to close.
The 2013 law required abortion clinics to meet the same standards as hospitalstyle surgical centers and required physicians who performed abortions to obtain
admitting privileges at a nearby hospital.
The U.S. Supreme Court struck down the law in 2016, ruling that it imposed an undue burden on a woman’s right to an abortion. The court said that as a result of clinic closures caused by the law, women in Texas had to drive farther and face longer wait times to obtain abortions.
Joe Pojman, executive director of Texas Alliance for Life, an Austin nonprofit opposed to abortion, said the data cited in the Texas Policy Evaluation Project study are too old to offer a sense of how accessible abortions are today.
Five abortion clinics and more than 100 centers offering alternatives to abortion have opened since the researchers conducted their final interviews and surveys, Pojman said.
“I believe there are grave reasons to question the relevance
of the data that the author is putting forward because it’s quite old and things have changed in Texas,” Pojman said.
There are 24 clinics performing abortions in Texas, down from 41 before the Texas law.
More than 52,000 abortions were reported in Texas in 2017, the most recent year for which data are available. In 2012, the year before passage of the law that restricted access to abortions, more than 68,000 were performed.
Texas has passed other abortion restrictions that have withstood legal challenges, including a 2011 law requiring abortion providers to show or describe an ultrasound image of a fetus to the mother and play sounds of the fetal heartbeat before moving forward with the procedure.