06/29/2022
The Worcester Asylum Clinic/UMass Chan Medical School's Chapter of Health Professionals for Human Rights (HPHR) stands with Physicians for Human Rights. We condemn the Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, a decision that will exert irreparable harm on patients and health care providers.
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"[The Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization] rolls back reproductive rights in the United States by decades and threatens the lives of pregnant people across the country.
“The Court’s silence on the impacts of this decision on bodily autonomy and health is appalling. This decision will trigger nothing short of a public health crisis, exacerbate existing health disparities, and further endanger already marginalized populations most.
“The criminalization of abortion does not decrease abortions – it only makes abortions less safe and contributes to increases in maternal mortality. The Supreme Court’s decision will likely lead to irreparable harms for patients and health workers across the country.
“The decision also places the United States in clear violation of international law and globally-recognized health and human rights standards. As United Nations Special Rapporteurs stated in their amicus curie brief submitted to the Supreme Court in this case, ‘the United States would contradict international human rights law by overturning its established constitutional protections for abortion access—both by failing to recognize abortion access as necessary for women’s autonomy, equality and non-discrimination and by retrogressing on human rights contrary to international law.’ Through this opinion, the United States is falling out of step with a global trend towards liberalization of abortion law.
“Following today’s ruling, 26 states are certain or likely to ban abortions. In large swaths of the country, it will be near-impossible to access comprehensive reproductive health care. The impacts will be felt most acutely by marginalized individuals who have limited means to seek safe and legal services, including low-income women and women of color.
“Abortion is health care, and an essential part of a spectrum of evidence-based, rights-respecting clinical reproductive health interventions. With Roe v. Wade dismantled, health workers will soon be placed in the untenable situation of having to decide between obeying new anti-abortion laws or fulfilling their medical ethics to deliver impartial, evidence-based health care. Violence and threats against health workers who provide reproductive health services – ranging from death threats to license revocation to physical violence – are on the rise and will likely increase as abortion is outlawed in states across the country. We stand in solidarity with health worker colleagues as they navigate this unprecedented rollback in reproductive rights and seek to provide science-based, rights-respecting health care to all in need.
“Physicians for Human Rights joins the chorus of medical organizations and advocates calling on states to enact protections and provisions to further safeguard access to safe abortion, including through offering protection, services, and support for patients and health workers who come from other states. States should shield people who access abortion services and health workers from prosecution and extradition to hostile states.
“As the majority decision also assailed the legal precedents that underpin other fundamental rights, including LGBTQ+ protections, access to contraception, and in*******al marriage, the Biden administration, Congress, and state legislatures must work assiduously to safeguard these human rights from further assault.”
“The dissenting opinion highlights the profound reversal of rights that women and people who can become pregnant will soon experience:
“‘After today, young women will come of age with fewer rights than their mothers and grandmothers had. The majority accomplishes that result without so much as considering how women have relied on the right to choose or what it means to take that right away.’
“With this decision, the U.S. stands on the wrong side of history.”
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In a May 2017 report, Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders surveyed patients at the clinics it supports throughout Mexico. One-third of the women surveyed had been sexually abused on their journey from Central America, and of the 166 sexual abuse survivors surveyed, 60 percent had been r***d.
For many, an abortion can save their life. Yet now, the Supreme Court's decision to restrict access to safe abortion places places even greater challenges on top of economic, legal, and cultural barriers to migrants who are pregnant.
PHR Press Release, 6/24/22:
In response to the decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization by the U.S. Supreme Court, the following statement is attributable to Payal Shah, J.D., director of PHR’s Program on Sexual Violence in Conflict Zones: “PHR condemns the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jacks...
