The Future of Abortion Rights | Amy Littlefield, Nora Caplan-Bricker
In March the NYR Online published Amy Littlefield’s sweeping overview of the shifts in abortion access since the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization effectively outlawed the procedure in more than a dozen states. Many of these changes have been driven by the expansion of telehealth services that dispense Mifepristone and Misoprostol, the drugs involved in medication abortion, through the mail; as a result some parts of the country have actually seen an increase in abortion access since Dobbs. But by early May this state of affairs was in flux yet again: the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled on May 1 in favor of a requirement that doctors prescribe Mifepristone only in person, which would starkly curtail its availability. The Supreme Court has since stayed that ruling and sent the case back to the Fifth Circuit, but it is likely that the question will be taken up again soon, both by the Trump administration and by the courts. I first met Littlefield in 2020, when we lived near each other …
