Survey: OBGYN's believe Dobbs decision exacerbated pregnancy-related deaths

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Wednesday, June 21, 2023
Survey: Supreme Court abortion ruling impacted pregnancy deaths
"It affects a lot more women than just women seeking abortion," Associate Director for Women's Health Policy at Kaiser Family Foundation Brittni Frederiksen said.

Saturday marks one year since the historic overturn of abortion rights, and a new survey of doctors revealed that the Supreme Court ruling may be having serious consequences.

The Kaiser Family Foundation's latest survey looked at responses from 560 OBGYNs this spring.

64% of them said they believe the Supreme Court's overturning of Roe v Wade exacerbated pregnancy-related mortality. More than half said it made it harder to attract new OBGYN's to the field.

"It affects a lot more women than just women seeking abortion," Associate Director for Women's Health Policy at Kaiser Family Foundation Brittni Frederiksen said.

And in states with abortion bans, 6 in 10 doctors expressed concerns about legal risk when making decisions about patient care.

"Many women are pregnant; many women experience miscarriages, and so it makes things that could be relatively straight forward procedures much more complicated because providers are having to question their judgement," Frederiksen said.

OBGYNs also report an increase in patients seeking long-term contraception including sterilization.

The Biden administration said it would continue pushing for national legislation to protect abortion rights.

Vice President Kamala Harris will be in North Carolina and addressing the impacts of the controversial ruling. She'll be visiting Charlotte Saturday, which is the one year anniversary of the Dobbs decision.

The White House has not yet released details on when and where she'll be speaking.

Harris said in a tweet Wednesday "the court took away a constitutional right."

She vows that the Biden administration is fighting to restore protections of Roe into federal law.

Republicans are pushing back and looking to create federal law further restricting abortion access across the country.

Senator Lindsey Graham said on Capitol Hill that he is planning to introduce new abortion legislation.

"I will introduce legislation soon creating a national minimum standard of 15 weeks," said Graham.

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