| With a statewide ban in effect, an unlikely political coalition works to insure that women can get lifesaving care.  Photograph by Sarah Karlan / Bloomberg / Getty Stephania Taladrid
Contributing writer Every day seems to bring a new dispute in the ongoing battle between those trying to restore or further restrict abortion rights. Last week, the Supreme Court heard arguments in a case that will determine the fate of mifepristone, a pill widely used in medication abortions. Earlier this week, in Florida, the state’s top court delivered two decisions that will shape abortion access for millions. The first decision instated a near-total ban on abortions after six weeks, long before many people know they are pregnant; the second decision will allow Floridians to vote, this November, on a constitutional amendment protecting abortion rights. Around the country, one in three women of reproductive age now lives in a state with strict bans on abortion; in some cases, as in Texas, their choices are constrained by laws that date back to the eighteen-hundreds. The Lone Star State now has three laws against abortion on the books, each with its own set of narrow exceptions, designed to protect the life of the mother. Women and doctors there have long argued that the language in these laws is so vague—and the penalties for misinterpreting them so steep—that the exceptions are practically meaningless. Today, in a new story from Texas, I write about how the legislature, the courts, and the state medical board have responded to laws that, in effect, have reframed reproductive medicine as a science of extremes, in which women are considered to be facing death or being saved from it, while the far more common realities in between get elided. Can a push for clearer definitions improve health outcomes for women—and better protect the doctors who serve them? And what could this latest development in Texas mean for women in other states that have strict abortion bans? Support The New Yorker’s award-winning journalism. Subscribe today » | 
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