Thirty Democratic senators led by Washington’s Patty Murray are calling on the Biden administration to use health care privacy laws to protect patients’ reproductive health information, specifically when it comes to abortion. In the letter sent Tuesday, first shared with The 19th, the senators ask the Biden administration to use the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) to prohibit health care providers and personnel from sharing any information about patients’ medical records “without explicit consent.”

As bans and restrictions proliferate across the country, abortion pill providers are pushing the envelope of regulations and laws to meet the surging demand for medication abortion in post-Roe America. Some are using physician discretion to prescribe pills to patients further along in pregnancy than the 10-week limit set by the Food and Drug Administration.

“The case of a Nebraska woman charged with helping her teenage daughter end her pregnancy after investigators obtained Facebook messages between the two has raised fresh concerns about data privacy in the post-Roe world.”

“Joe Biden signed a second executive order on Wednesday that aims to protect access to reproductive healthcare after the US supreme court struck down the constitutional right to abortion.”

“Karen Kaiser says she will never forget her feelings of dread and sadness as she hurried past picket lines of antiabortion protesters in 2008. In the waiting room of a Maryland Planned Parenthood, “I remember crying,” she said. Kaiser had decided to have an abortion in part because she was taking a medication called Depakote to control her bipolar disorder.”

“Last year, a 35-year-old woman named Amanda, who lives in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, had a miscarriage in the first trimester of her pregnancy. At a large hospital, a doctor performed a surgical procedure often used as a safe and quick method to remove tissue from a failed pregnancy… Eight months later,”

“President Biden attempted to preserve abortion access on Friday through executive action but stopped short of restoring full access to the procedure or preventing states from enacting their own restrictions or bans. The executive order Biden signed empowers Health and Human Services (HHS) in a variety of ways,”

“Abortion rights activists say the Supreme Court’s decision to strike down Roe v. Wade will reverberate around the world, possibly restricting access to the procedure in other countries and weakening the global movement for reproductive rights.”

Repro health news from the week of June 6 – 10, 2022.

Repro Health Watch is a weekly email digest designed to give you the most important reproductive health news of the week.

Note: The information contained in this publication reflects media coverage of women’s health issues and does not necessarily reflect the views of the National Partnership for Women & Families.