Ruling is first step to improving abortion access

Until Monday’s Supreme Court ruling declaring HB2’s extreme barriers to safe, legal abortion as unconstitutional, I feared my daughters would live with fewer rights and control over their personal, medical decisions than their mother, and that the tragic trend could continue for my granddaughters. As the board chair of Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast, I have witnessed the ongoing irrational attacks on access to reproductive health care. The impact of HB2 and years of laws passed under the guise of “protecting women’s health” have been devastating.

HB2 was passed in 2013 after then-state Sen. Wendy Davis’ historic filibuster and an outpouring from thousands who stood with Texas women in opposition to the draconian bill. HB2’s extreme provisions requiring doctors to have admitting privileges at hospitals within 30 miles and for abortions to be provided in mini-hospital settings have had immediate and enduring health consequences on women in Houston and across Texas.

Politicians claimed they cared about women’s health yet passed medically unnecessary restrictions that shuttered nearly half of the abortion providers in the state and made it nearly impossible for a woman to end her pregnancy. The dearth of abortion providers in Texas, a state the size of France, means hundreds of thousands of women lost access to safe, legal abortion. Since the law passed, a woman’s access to the health care she needs has been determined by her ZIP code and not her medical needs. With limited access to providers, women have had to travel hundreds of miles and unnecessarily delay the procedure. And, while abortion is extremely safe, with less than 1 percent complication rate according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, a woman faces higher complication risk if it occurs later in her pregnancy.

Nearly three years later, Texas’ hollow claim of protecting women’s health was most evident during the Supreme Court oral argument last March. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg questioned Texas’ concern for women’s health after they argued a woman in El Paso, who was now hundreds of miles from a provider in Texas, could simply cross the state line to find a provider in New Mexico. New Mexico does not force the same restrictions on abortion providers. Justice Ginsburg deftly skewered arguments by the state’s lawyers, inquiring, “If that’s all right for the women in the El Paso area, why isn’t it right for the rest of the women in Texas?”

In Monday’s ruling the court recognized, “neither of these provisions offers medical benefits sufficient to justify the burdens upon access that each imposes.” This landmark ruling is an enormous win for women. The court recognized that these laws do not enhance patient safety — rather, they punish women by blocking access to safe abortion. Sadly, the victory does not undo the damage of more than 300 abortion restrictions already written into law. I can remember the days before Roe v. Wade. Women made desperate choices and risked their health and lives. Laws like HB2 and similar laws pending in courts and legislatures across the nation are a calculated attempt to take us back to those dark days when abortion was illegal, unsafe and women died. That is why we must take fight for access to reproductive health care state to state.

This is a first step — the Supreme Court has made it clear that politicians cannot pass laws to block access to safe, legal abortion. While the decision is a tremendous victory, far too many women still face insurmountable barriers to safely accessing their legal right to have an abortion. Women are already traveling hundreds of miles, crossing state lines and waiting weeks to get an abortion, if they can at all. This often has a disproportionate impact on communities of color, people who live in rural areas, and undocumented individuals, who already face barriers in accessing quality health care.

While the ruling is a victory and an overdue cause for celebration, we are reminded to never stop fighting for access to health care. And, we should not be fooled that politicians are simply focused on ending abortion. In 2011, many of the same politicians slashed low-income, uninsured women’s access to lifesaving cancer screenings and birth control.

We cannot stand by while women are punished for seeking the care they need. A person’s right to make their own decisions about their health shouldn’t depend on who they are or where they live. It’s time to pass state laws to protect a woman’s constitutional right to abortion, and repeal ones that block it.