BEIJING/HONG KONG, Jan 17 (Reuters) – China’s population fell last year for the first time in six decades, a historic turn that is expected to mark the start of a long period of decline in its citizen numbers with profound implications for its economy and the world.
The drop, the worst since 1961, the last year of China’s Great Famine, also lends weight to predictions that India will become the world’s most populous nation this year.
China’s population declined by roughly 850,000 to 1.41175 billion at the end of 2022, the country’s National Bureau of Statistics said.
Long-term, U.N. experts see China’s population shrinking by 109 million by 2050, more than triple the decline of their previous forecast in 2019.
That’s caused domestic demographers to lament that China will get old before it gets rich, slowing the economy as revenues drop and government debt increases due to soaring health and welfare costs.
“China’s demographic and economic outlook is much bleaker than expected. China will have to adjust its social, economic, defense and foreign policies,” said demographer Yi Fuxian.
He added that the country’s shrinking labour force and downturn in manufacturing heft would further exacerbate high prices and high inflation in the United States and Europe.
Kang Yi, head of the national statistics bureau, told reporters that people should not worry about the decline in population as “overall labour supply still exceeds demand”.
China’s birth rate last year was just 6.77 births per 1,000 people, down from a rate of 7.52 births in 2021 and marking the lowest birth rate on record.
The number of Chinese women of childbearing age, which the government defines as 25 to 35, fell by about 4 million, Kang said.
The death rate, the highest since 1974 during the Cultural Revolution, was 7.37 deaths per 1,000 people, which compares with rate of 7.18 deaths in 2021.
ONE-CHILD POLICY IMPACT
Much of the demographic downturn is the result of China’s one-child policy imposed between 1980 and 2015 as well as sky-high education costs that have put many Chinese off having more than one child or even having any at all.
The data was the top trending topic on Chinese social media after the figures were released on Tuesday. One hashtag,”#Is it really important to have offspring?” had hundreds of millions of hits.
“The fundamental reason why women do not want to have children lies not in themselves, but in the failure of society and men to take up the responsibility of raising children. For women who give birth this leads to a serious decline in their quality of life and spiritual life,” posted one netizen with the username Joyful Ned.
China’s stringent zero-COVID policies that were in place for three years have caused further damage to the country’s demographic outlook, population experts have said.
Local governments have since 2021 rolled out measures to encourage people to have more babies, including tax deductions, longer maternity leave and housing subsidies. President Xi Jinping also said in October the government would enact further supportive policies.
The measures so far, however, have done little to arrest the long-term trend.
Online searches for baby strollers on China’s Baidu search engine dropped 17% in 2022 and are down 41% since 2018, while searches for baby bottles are down more than a third since 2018. In contrast, searches for elderly care homes surged eight-fold last year.
The reverse is playing out in India, where Google Trends shows a 15% year-on-year increase in searches for baby bottles in 2022, while searches for cribs rose almost five-fold.
Reuters Graphics
Reporting by Albee Zhang in Beijing and Farah Master in Hong Kong; Additional reporting by Kevin Yao and Ella Cao in Beijing; Editing by Edwina Gibbs
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July 10 (Reuters) – U.S. President Joe Biden on Sunday said he has asked his administration to consider whether he has authority to declare an abortion-related public health emergency after the Supreme Court overturned the Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion nationwide.
The comments come after Biden on Friday signed an executive order to ease access to services to terminate pregnancies. read more
Biden was on his way to a bike ride near his residence in Delaware when he stopped to speak to reporters, who asked if he was considering declaring a public health emergency regarding abortion access. The president responded that he was asking his staff to see “whether I have the authority” and what the impacts would be.
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U.S. President Joe Biden speaks before signing an executive order to help safeguard women’s access to abortion and contraception after the Supreme Court last month overturned Roe v Wade decision that legalized abortion, at the White House in Washington, U.S., July 8, 2022. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque
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Biden, a Democrat, has been under pressure from his own party to take action after the landmark decision last month to overturn Roe v. Wade, which upended roughly 50 years of protections for women’s reproductive rights.
On his stop to speak with reporters, Biden said his goal was to codify abortion rights through legislation and delivered a message to abortion rights protesters who have gathered outside the White House.
“Keep protesting. Keep making your point. It’s critically important,” he said. “We can do a lot of things to accommodate the rights of women.”
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Reporting by Nandita Bose; Writing by Tyler Clifford in New York; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama
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WASHINGTON, June 24 (Reuters) – Public figures across the political spectrum reacted to the U.S. Supreme Court ruling on Friday overturning the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that recognized a woman’s constitutional right to an abortion and legalized it nationwide. read more
PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN IN A LIVE ANNOUNCEMENT:
“Today the Supreme Court of the United States expressly took away a constitutional right from the American people that it had already recognized.”
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“This is a sad day for the country in my view. But it doesn’t mean the fight’s over. Let me be very clear and unambiguous: the only way we can secure a woman’s right to choose a balance that exists is for Congress to restore the protections of Roe v. Wade as federal law.”
“Voters need to make their voices heard. This fall (they) must elect more senators and representatives who will codify a woman’s right to choose into federal law once again.”
“I’ve warned about how this decision risks the broader right to privacy for everyone … The right to make the best decisions for your health. The right to use birth control, a married couple in the privacy of their bedroom.”
STEPHANE DUJARRIC, SPOKESMAN FOR U.N. SECRETARY-GENERAL ANTONIO GUTERRES
“Sexual and reproductive health and rights are the foundation of a life of choice, empowerment and equality for the world’s women and girls … Restricting access to abortion does not prevent people from seeking abortion, it only makes it more deadly.”
HOUSE SPEAKER NANCY PELOSI, A DEMOCRAT, IN A STATEMENT:
“This cruel ruling is outrageous and heart-wrenching. But make no mistake: the rights of women and all Americans are on the ballot this November.”
SENATE REPUBLICAN LEADER MITCH MCCONNELL IN A STATEMENT:
“This is an historic victory for the Constitution and for the most vulnerable in our society.”
(The decision is) “courageous and correct.”
PLANNED PARENTHOOD:
“SCOTUS may have just ended our constitutional right to abortion, but know this: Abortion is health care, and you deserve to control your body and your future, no matter what. That hasn’t changed. We can’t and we won’t back down now.”
WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION (WHO) DIRECTOR-GENERAL TEDROS ADHANOM GHEBREYESUS, TO REUTERS:
“I am very disappointed, because women’s rights must be protected. And I would have expected America to protect such rights.”
REPUBLICAN FORMER PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP:
“This is following the Constitution, and giving rights back when they should have been given long ago … This brings everything back to the states where it has always belonged.”
U.S. President Joe Biden delivers remarks after the the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the Dobbs v Women’s Health Organization abortion case, overturning the landmark Roe v Wade abortion decision, at the White House in Washington, U.S., June 24, 2022. REUTERS/Elizabeth Frantz
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FORMER VICE PRESIDENT MIKE PENCE IN A STATEMENT:
“Today, Life Won. By overturning Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court of the United States has given the American people a new beginning for life, and I commend the justices in the majority for having the courage of their convictions.
DEMOCRATIC FORMER PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA:
“Today, the Supreme Court not only reversed nearly 50 years of precedent, it relegated the most intensely personal decision someone can make to the whims of politicians and ideologues -attacking the essential freedoms of millions of Americans.”
FORMER SECRETARY OF STATE HILLARY CLINTON:
“Most Americans believe the decision to have a child is one of the most sacred decisions there is, and that such decisions should remain between patients and their doctors. Today’s Supreme Court opinion will live in infamy as a step backward for women’s rights and human rights.”
FRENCH PRESIDENT EMMANUEL MACRON, ON TWITTER:
“Abortion is a fundamental right for all women. We must protect it. I would like to express my solidarity with all those women whose freedoms have today been compromised by the U.S. Supreme Court.”
CANADIAN PRIME MINISTER JUSTIN TRUDEAU ON TWITTER:
“The news coming out of the United States is horrific. My heart goes out to the millions of American women who are now set to lose their legal right to an abortion … No government, politician, or man should tell a woman what she can and cannot do with her body.”
BRITISH PRIME MINISTER BORIS JOHNSON AT A NEWS CONFERENCE:
“I think it’s a big step backwards … I’ve always believed in a woman’s right to choose and I stick to that view and that is why the UK has the laws that it does.”
SENATE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE CHAIRMAN DICK DURBIN, IN A STATEMENT:
“I will keep fighting to enshrine into law a woman’s right to make her own reproductive choices. We cannot let our children inherit a nation that is less free and more dangerous than the one their parents grew up in.”
KEVIN MCCARTHY, STEVE SCALISE AND ELISE STEFANIK, THE TOP THREE REPUBLICANS IN THE U.S. HOUSE, IN A JOINT STATEMENT:
“We applaud this historic ruling, which will save countless innocent lives. The Supreme Court is right to return the power to protect the unborn to the people’s elected representatives in Congress and the states.”
MINI TIMMARAJU, PRESIDENT OF NARAL PRO-CHOICE AMERICA:
“The impact on the real lives of real people will be devastating … Though we’re grieving the end of the constitutional right to abortion in our country and what it will mean for all of those who need access to care, this fight is far from over.”
PENNY YOUNG NANCE, CEO AND PRESIDENT OF ANTI-ABORTION GROUP CONCERNED WOMEN FOR AMERICA:
“We feel empowered to go on a state-by-state basis and fight for what we believe in. Before we couldn’t even have a conversation in state legislatures … Certainly the federal government has a role to play but this is going to be about the states.”
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Reporting by David Morgan, Timothy Ahmann, David Morgan, Doina Chiacu, Chris Gallagher, Rose Horowitch and Susan Heavey in Washington, Ismail Shakil in Ottawa, and Ayenat Mersie and Andrew MacAskill in Kigali; Compiled by Chris Gallagher; Edited by Howard Goller
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Conservative justices power ruling; liberals dissent
Biden condemns ruling as a ‘sad day’ for America
Justice Alito calls Roe v. Wade ‘egregiously wrong’
WASHINGTON, June 24 (Reuters) – The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday overturned the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling that recognized women’s constitutional right to abortion, a decision condemned by President Joe Biden that will dramatically change life for millions of women in America and exacerbate growing tensions in a deeply polarized country.
The court, in a 6-3 ruling powered by its conservative majority, upheld a Republican-backed Mississippi law that bans abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy. The vote was 5-4 to overturn Roe, with conservative Chief Justice John Roberts writing separately to say he would have upheld the Mississippi law without taking the additional step of erasing the Roe precedent altogether.
The reverberations of the ruling will be felt far beyond the court’s high-security confines – potentially reshaping the battlefield in November’s elections to determine whether Biden’s fellow Democrats retain control of Congress and signaling a new openness by the justices to change other long-recognized rights.
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The decision will also intensify debate over the legitimacy of the court, once an unassailable cornerstone of the American democratic system but increasingly under scrutiny for its more aggressively conservative decisions on a range of issues.
The ruling restored the ability of states to ban abortion. Twenty-six states are either certain or considered likely to ban abortion. Mississippi is among 13 states with so-called trigger laws to ban abortion with Roe overturned. (For related graphic click https://tmsnrt.rs/3Njv3Cw)
In a concurring opinion that raised concerns the justices might roll back other rights, conservative Justice Clarence Thomas urged the court to reconsider past rulings protecting the right to contraception, legalizing gay marriage nationwide, and invalidating state laws banning gay sex.
The justices, in the ruling written by conservative Justice Samuel Alito, held that the Roe decision that allowed abortions performed before a fetus would be viable outside the womb – which occurs between 24 and 28 weeks of pregnancy – was wrongly decided because the U.S. Constitution makes no specific mention of abortion rights.
Women with unwanted pregnancies in large swathes of America now may face the choice of traveling to another state where the procedure remains legal and available, buying abortion pills online, or having a potentially dangerous illegal abortion.
Justice Brett Kavanaugh, in a concurring opinion, appeared to nix an idea advocated by some anti-abortion advocates that the next step is for the court to declare that the Constitution outlaws abortion. “The Constitution neither outlaws abortion nor legalizes abortion,” Kavanaugh wrote.
Kavanaugh also said that the ruling does not let states bar residents from traveling to another state to obtain an abortion, or retroactively punish people for prior abortions.
‘SAD DAY’
Biden condemned the ruling as taking an “extreme and dangerous path.”
“It’s a sad day for the court and for the country,” Biden said at the White House. “The court has done what it has never done before: expressly take away a constitutional right that is so fundamental to so many Americans.”
Empowering states to ban abortion makes the United States an outlier among developed nations on protecting reproductive rights, the Democratic president added.
Biden urged Congress to pass a law protecting abortion rights, an unlikely proposition given its partisan divisions. Biden said his administration will protect women’s access to medications approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration including pills for contraception and medication abortion, while also combating efforts to restrict women from traveling to other states to obtain abortions.
Britain, France and some other nations called the ruling a step backward, although the Vatican praised it, saying it challenged the world to reflect on life issues. read more
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said the decision was “a loss for women everywhere”. “Watching the removal of a woman’s fundamental right to make decisions over their own body is incredibly upsetting,” she said in a statement.
Anti-abortion demonstrators celebrate outside the United States Supreme Court as the court rules in the Dobbs v Women’s Health Organization abortion case, overturning the landmark Roe v Wade abortion decision in Washington, U.S., June 24, 2022. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein
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U.S. companies including Walt Disney Co (DIS.N), AT&T and Facebook parent Meta Platforms Inc (META.O) said they will cover employees’ expenses if they now have to travel for abortion services. read more
‘DAMAGING CONSEQUENCES’
A draft version of Alito’s ruling indicating the court was ready to overturn Roe was leaked in May, igniting a political firestorm. Friday’s ruling largely tracked this leaked draft.
“The Constitution makes no reference to abortion, and no such right is implicitly protected by any constitutional provision,” Alito wrote in the ruling.
Roe v. Wade recognized that the right to personal privacy under the Constitution protects a woman’s ability to terminate her pregnancy. The Supreme Court in a 1992 ruling called Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey reaffirmed abortion rights and prohibited laws imposing an “undue burden” on abortion access. Friday’s ruling overturned the Casey decision as well.
“Roe was egregiously wrong from the start. Its reasoning was exceptionally weak, and the decision has had damaging consequences. And far from bringing about a national settlement of the abortion issue, Roe and Casey have enflamed debate and deepened division,” Alito added.
The court’s three liberal justices – Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan – issued a jointly authored dissent.
“Whatever the exact scope of the coming laws, one result of today’s decision is certain: the curtailment of women’s rights, and of their status as free and equal citizens,” they wrote.
As a result of Friday’s ruling, “from the very moment of fertilization, a woman has no rights to speak of. A state can force her to bring a pregnancy to term, even at the steepest personal and familial costs,” the liberal justices added.
The ruling empowered states to ban abortion just a day after the court’s conservative majority issued another decision limiting the ability of states to enact gun restrictions. read more
The abortion and gun rulings illustrated the polarization in America on a range of issues, also including race and voting rights.
Overturning Roe was long a goal of Christian conservatives and many Republican officeholders, including former President Donald Trump, who as a candidate in 2016 promised to appoint justices to the Supreme Court who would reverse Roe. During his term he named three to the bench, all of whom joined the majority in the ruling.
Asked in a Fox News interview whether he deserved some credit for the ruling, Trump said: “God made the decision.”
Crowds gathered outside the courthouse, surrounded by a tall security fence. Anti-abortion activists erupted in cheers after the ruling, while some abortion rights supporters were in tears.
“I’m ecstatic,” said Emma Craig, 36, of Pro Life San Francisco. “Abortion is the biggest tragedy of our generation and in 50 years we’ll look back at the 50 years we’ve been under Roe v. Wade with shame.”
Hours later, protesters angered by the decision still gathered outside the court, as did crowds in cities from coast to coast including New York, Atlanta, Chicago, Denver, Los Angeles and Seattle.
House of Representatives Speaker Democrat Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat, denounced the decision, saying that a “Republican-controlled Supreme Court” has achieved that party’s “dark and extreme goal of ripping away women’s right to make their own reproductive health decisions.”
The number of U.S. abortions increased by 8% during the three years ending in 2020, reversing a 30-year trend of declining numbers, according to data released on June 15 by the Guttmacher Institute, a research group that supports abortion rights. read more
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Reporting by Lawrence Hurley and Andrew Chung; Additional reporting by Katanga Johnson and Rose Horowitch; Writing by Lawrence Hurley and Ross Colvin; Editing by Will Dunham, Scott Malone, Daniel Wallis and Michael Perry
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
PALO ALTO, Calif., June 24 (Reuters) – The technology industry is bracing for the uncomfortable possibility of having to hand over pregnancy-related data to law enforcement, in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision on Friday to overturn the Roe v. Wade precedent that for decades guaranteed a woman’s constitutional right to an abortion. read more
As state laws limiting abortion kick in after the ruling, technology trade representatives told Reuters they fear police will obtain warrants for customers’ search history, geolocation and other information indicating plans to terminate a pregnancy. Prosecutors could access the same via a subpoena, too.
The concern reflects how the data collection practices of companies like Alphabet Inc’s (GOOGL.O) Google, Facebook parent Meta Platforms Inc (META.O) and Amazon.com Inc (AMZN.O) have the potential to incriminate abortion-seekers for state laws that many in Silicon Valley oppose.
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“It is very likely that there’s going to be requests made to those tech companies for information related to search histories, to websites visited,” said Cynthia Conti-Cook, a technology fellow at the Ford Foundation.
Google declined to comment. Representatives for Amazon and Meta did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Folders containing medical records of abortions that took place inside Tulsa Women’s Clinic, prior to Oklahoma’s abortion ban, are pictured in Tulsa, Oklahoma, U.S. June 20, 2022. REUTERS/Liliana Salgado/File Photo
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Technology has long gathered – and at times revealed – sensitive pregnancy-related information about consumers. In 2015, abortion opponents targeted ads saying “Pregnancy Help” and “You Have Choices” to individuals entering reproductive health clinics, using so-called geofencing technology to identify smartphones in the area.
More recently, Mississippi prosecutors charged a mother with second-degree murder after her smartphone showed she had searched for abortion medication in her third trimester, local media reported. Conti-Cook said, “I can’t even imagine the depth of information that my phone has on my life.”
While suspects unwittingly can hand over their phones and volunteer information used to prosecute them, investigators may well turn to tech companies in the absence of strong leads or evidence. In United States v. Chatrie, for example, police obtained a warrant for Google location data that led them to Okello Chatrie in an investigation of a 2019 bank robbery.
Amazon, for instance, complied at least partially with 75% of search warrants, subpoenas and other court orders demanding data on U.S. customers, the company disclosed for the three years ending in June 2020. It complied fully with 38%. Amazon has said it must comply with “valid and binding orders,” but its goal is to provide “the minimum” that the law requires.
Eva Galperin, cybersecurity director at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, said on Twitter on Friday, “The difference between now and the last time that abortion was illegal in the United States is that we live in an era of unprecedented digital surveillance.”
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Reporting by Jeffrey Dastin and Katie Paul in Palo Alto, Calif., Paresh Dave in Oakland, Calif., and Stephen Nellis
Editing by Anna Driver and Matthew Lewis
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
Liberal justices warn against overturning precedents
Mississippi law bans abortion at 15 weeks of pregnancy
Biden lawyer urges against “contraction” of rights
WASHINGTON, Dec 1 (Reuters) – Conservative U.S. Supreme Court justices on Wednesday signaled a willingness to dramatically curtail abortion rights in America and perhaps overturn the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling that legalized the procedure nationwide as they indicated they would uphold a restrictive Republican-backed Mississippi law.
The court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority, heard about two hours of oral arguments in the southern state’s bid to revive its ban on abortion starting at 15 weeks of pregnancy, a law blocked by lower courts. The liberal justices warned against ditching important and longstanding legal precedents like Roe and abandoning a right American women have come to rely upon.
Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the only abortion clinic in Mississippi, challenged the law and has the support of Democratic President Joe Biden’s administration. A ruling is expected by the end of next June.
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Roe v. Wade recognized that the right to personal privacy under the U.S. Constitution protects a woman’s ability to terminate her pregnancy. The Supreme Court in a 1992 ruling called Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey reaffirmed abortion rights and prohibited laws imposing an “undue burden” on abortion access. Mississippi asked the justices to overturn the Roe and Casey rulings.
Conservative Justice Brett Kavanaugh voiced a view often expressed by abortion opponents that nothing in the Constitution protects abortion rights.
“The Constitution is neither pro-life nor pro-choice on the question of abortion but leaves the issue to the people of the states or perhaps Congress to resolve in the democratic process,” Kavanaugh said.
If Roe were overturned, many states “would continue to freely allow abortion,” Kavanaugh added. Before the Roe ruling, many states banned abortion.
Julie Rikelman, arguing for the abortion clinic, said overturning Roe would not mean the court is neutral on abortion as Kavanaugh suggested.
“Women have an equal right to liberty under the Constitution, Your Honor, and if they’re not able to make this decision, if states can take control of women’s bodies and force them to endure months of pregnancy and childbirth, then they will never have equal status under the Constitution,” Rikelman told Kavanaugh.
About one in four American women has had an abortion, Rikelman added.
‘SURVIVE THE STENCH’
Liberal Justice Sonia Sotomayor said Mississippi officials sought to bring the issue to the justices only because of the court’s rightward shift.
“Will this institution survive the stench this creates in the public perception that the Constitution and its reading are just political acts?” Sotomayor asked.
Kavanaugh and Justice Amy Coney Barrett – both appointees of Republican former President Donald Trump, who promised to name justices who would overturn Roe – could be key votes in determining how far the court will go. Barrett said overturning a major precedent is justified in certain instances but wondered whether “public reaction” should be considered.
Barrett also asked whether the recent adoption in some states of “safe haven” laws, which let women hand over unwanted babies to healthcare facilities without penalty, undermines certain justifications for abortions because women are not forced into motherhood merely by giving birth.
Supreme Court Police officers erect a barrier between anti-abortion and pro-abortion rights protesters outside the court building, ahead of arguments in the Mississippi abortion rights case Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health, in Washington, U.S., December 1, 2021. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst
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Conservative Chief Justice John Roberts suggested the court could uphold Mississippi’s law without overturning Roe. It was unclear if the five other conservatives would stop short of toppling Roe.
“Why is 15 weeks not enough time” for a woman to decide to have an abortion, Roberts asked.
Mississippi’s ban is one of a series of restrictive abortion laws passed in Republican-governed states in recent years. The Supreme Court on Nov. 1 heard arguments over a Texas law banning abortion at around six weeks of pregnancy but has not yet issued a ruling.
Anti-abortion advocates believe they are closer than ever to overturning Roe, a longstanding goal for Christian conservatives.
‘EGREGIOUSLY WRONG’
Conservative justices downplayed the idea that the court must be careful in overturning its own precedents, noting that it has done so in many contexts including overturning a notorious 1895 ruling allowing racial segregation.
“So there are circumstances in which a decision … must be overruled simply because it was egregiously wrong at the moment it was decided,” conservative Justice Samuel Alito said.
U.S. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar, representing Biden’s administration, said overturning Roe would be an “unprecedented contraction” of individual rights.
“The court has never revoked a right that is so fundamental to so many Americans and so central to their ability to participate fully and equally in society,” Prelogar said.
Opinion polls show a majority of Americans support abortion rights.
The Roe and Casey decisions determined that states cannot ban abortion before a fetus is viable outside the womb, generally viewed by doctors as between 24 and 28 weeks. Mississippi’s 15-week ban challenges that. Roberts said a ban at 15 weeks is “not a dramatic departure” from viability.
Scott Stewart, arguing for Mississippi, said the Roe and Casey rulings “haunt our country.”
“They have no basis in the Constitution. They have no home in our history or traditions. They’ve damaged the democratic process. They’ve poisoned the law. They’ve choked off compromise,” Stewart said.
Mississippi is among 12 states with so-called trigger laws designed to ban abortion if Roe v. Wade is overturned. Additional states likely would rapidly curtail abortion access. (See related graphic)
If Roe were overturned or limited, in large swathes of America women who want to end a pregnancy could face the choice of having a potentially dangerous illegal abortion, traveling to another state where the procedure remains legal and available or buying abortion pills online. The procedure would remain legal in liberal-leaning states, 15 of which have laws protecting abortion rights.
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Reporting by Lawrence Hurley and Andrew Chung; Additional reporting by Gabriella Borter, Jan Wolfe and Julia Harte; Editing by Will Dunham
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