In Poland, Testing Women for Abortion Drugs Is a Reality. It Could Happen Here.

[Eugene]

Also: Poland: Abortion Witch Hunt Targets Women, Doctors (Human Rights Watch)

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Source: New York Times

In Poland, Testing Women for Abortion Drugs Is a Reality. It Could Happen Here.

Sept. 14, 2023, 5:00 a.m. ET

By Patrick Adams
Mr. Adams is a freelance journalist based in Atlanta.

Nearly three years ago, Poland’s Constitutional Tribunal effectively ended legal abortion in the country. Since then, the Polish government has vigorously repressed the nation’s reproductive rights movement and ramped up surveillance of women who are suspected of terminating their pregnancies. Authorities have violently dispersed demonstrations, threatened activists with prison time and ordered doctors to record all pregnancies in a new national database.

Even before Roe v. Wade was overturned last summer, Poland’s draconian crackdown, which was spearheaded by the governing right-wing Law and Justice party, should have been alarming to American supporters of abortion rights. It was always possible that some aspects of what has happened there could happen here.

Now there are reports that laboratory tests to detect abortion drugs have not only been created in Poland but are, in rare cases, also being used there to investigate the outcomes of pregnancies. These tests are not yet known to be in use anywhere else in the world. But Americans would be wise to plan for the possibility that the technology could one day be adopted on this side of the Atlantic and used by law enforcement to suss out whether women have taken abortion pills — which are now banned or restricted in more than two dozen states.

Women in both Poland and the United States have increasingly relied on informal networks for access to mifepristone and misoprostol, the drugs typically used in a medication abortion. In both countries, women can easily find information online and via telephone hotlines about how to use them to safely self-manage an abortion. That information often includes tips for protecting yourself from being targeted by law enforcement, as has already happened to some women who took abortion pills or were suspected of doing so.

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Read more: https://archive.li/ZA7x9

Original NYT link (paywall): https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/14/opinion/abortion-pills-testing-poland.html

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Source: Human Rights Watch

September 14, 2023 12:30AM EDT

Poland: Abortion Witch Hunt Targets Women, Doctors

Criminalization, Pursuit of Alleged Offenders Violates Rights

(London) – Poland’s government is targeting people for alleged abortion-related activities, intensifying a climate of fear that heightens risks for women and girls, Human Rights Watch said today. Human Rights Watch released a video highlighting how the government’s dubious use of its powers to chase down alleged abortion-related activity threatens people’s rights to privacy, autonomy, and health, amongst others.

Since a near-ban on legal abortion in 2020, Polish officials have increasingly opened investigations on questionable legal grounds against women and girls seeking medical care for miscarriages or after legal medication abortions, as well as against doctors. Polish law does not criminalize having an abortion but rather anyone who provides or assists someone in having an abortion outside of highly restricted grounds. The government is apparently attempting to find a basis for prosecuting family members, friends, and healthcare providers for illegally providing or assisting abortions.

“Polish authorities’ ruthless pursuit of people trying to get or provide basic health care can only be described as a witch hunt,” said Hillary Margolis, senior women’s rights researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The government is misusing police and courts to advance its anti-rights agenda, taking its abusive policies into private homes, hospital rooms, and doctors’ offices.”

In interviews with Human Rights Watch, doctors, lawyers, and a woman who had a legal medication abortion described sweeping and speculative investigations, and overbroad searches. Criminalizing those who provide or assist an abortion unjustifiably interferes with the right to health, leading to negative health outcomes and potential persecution of those seeking abortion.

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Read more: https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/09/14/poland-abortion-witch-hunt-targets-women-doctors