Even if the Supreme Court were to overturn Roe v. Wade, women have more methods to avoid unwanted pregnancies, as well as safer, easier options for abortion than they did before the landmark case was decided in 1973.
FILE - In this Wednesday, April 26, 1989 file photo, Norma McCorvey, Jane Roe in the 1973 court case, left, and her attorney Gloria Allred hold hands as they leave the Supreme Court building in Washington after sitting in while the court listened to arguments in a Missouri abortion case. A wave of state abortion bans in 2019 has set off speculation: What would happen if Roe v.
In 1974, a year after Roe, there were about 899,000 abortions in the U.S., according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research organization that supports abortion rights. A woman can get the morning-after pill without a prescription and keep some in her medicine cabinet for emergencies. Her smartphone sends birth control reminders. Or, if she prefers, a matchstick-size implant gives her no-hassle contraception for years at a time.
Her experience contrasts with that of Vikki Wachtel, who as an 18-year-old attending school in Connecticut had an abortion in New York City’s Bellevue Hospital in October 1970. That was just a few months after New York became a pioneer in broadly legalizing abortion. Abortion-rights activists, at rallies supporting Roe v. Wade, often display images of coat hangers that were sometimes used in illegal abortions many decades ago.
“If the recent events have shown us anything, it’s that self-managed abortion is vital to current and future reproductive rights in the United States,” Adams said.One crucial change since 1973 is the development of ultrasound technology. For many Americans, the first image they now see of a son, daughter or grandchild is often a sound wave scan of the fetus.
“If someone is six weeks pregnant, that’s not a viable pregnancy,” Davis said. “And some fetuses will never be viable because they have a lethal abnormality and will die after birth.”In the aftermath of Roe, it took years for supporters and opponents of abortion rights to entrench themselves in the polarized camps of today.
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