Regressive Reproductive Healthcare Laws Threaten People, Wildlife
What do bats, whales and turtles have in common with abortion rights advocates?
Today is Earth Overshoot Day, which marks the date when humanity’s demand for ecological resources and services in a given year exceeds what Earth can regenerate in that year. The more of us there are, the less planet there is for each of us as well as for wildlife. Through education and reproductive justice (including universal access to safe birth control), we can help ensure that future generations can thrive in a beautiful, hospitable world.
Arkansas, Kentucky, Mississippi, Utah, Ohio, Georgia, Alabama, Louisiana and Missouri.
For the past few months, it seems like a new state has passed an outrageous abortion bill each week. These laws have no basis in medical science or regard for anyone’s wellbeing. They are dangerous for people.
But what might be less obvious is the danger they pose to the environment.
Perhaps it’s no coincidence that the states listed don’t just have archaic abortion laws in common. They are also some of the states with the highest numbers of endangered species in the country.
From sea to sky, some incredible species call these states home. Ozark hellbenders, North America’s largest amphibians, are only found in streams in northern Missouri and southern Arkansas. They’re threatened by water pollution from urban and agricultural development.
Marine mammals like fin whales off the coast of the Mississippi and North Atlantic right whales off Georgia’s coast are victims of ship strikes and entanglement in fishing gear.
Multiple sea turtle species are losing nesting habitat to increased coastal development and storm surges in Louisiana. Utah’s Kanab amber snail populations are getting washed away in dam releases. Indiana bats are threatened by increased development and recreational activities in its home states of Ohio, Kentucky and Alabama.
All these threats are driven by human population pressure.
Unsustainable population growth and lack of access to reproductive health care also puts pressure on human communities. In some places in the world, it is worsening food and water shortages and reducing resilience in the face of climate change.
An essential part of addressing these issues is ensuring everyone has access to reproductive healthcare, including safe and legal abortion. But it doesn’t rest on that alone. Comprehensive sex ed and universal access to all forms of contraception are crucial for ensuring that people only add to their family when and if they are ready to.
Five out of nine of these states don’t have mandated sex education. And when they do provide sex ed, it’s often not based in science.
That means that the information that does get passed along isn’t useful, nor is it required to be medically accurate. All nine of these states require that educators stress abstinence. And nearly all of them require an emphasis on the importance of sex only within marriage.
The United States’ birth rates are the lowest they’ve been in 30 years, likely due to the success of teen pregnancy prevention programs and improved access to affordable contraception from the Affordable Care Act.
But still nearly 50 percent of all pregnancies in the U.S. are unplanned, and the population is still growing.
When politicians disregard science, medicine and human rights, it’s the most vulnerable among us who suffer. We need unfettered access to education and contraception for everyone, whether they prefer condoms, oral birth control or long-acting contraceptives like an IUD or vasectomy. Reproductive healthcare should be decided between individuals and their doctors, not by legislators.
Every person should have the tools, information and ability to make the best reproductive choice for themselves, their partner — and the planet.
