Dr. Ronli Sifris, deputy director of the Castan Center for Human Rights Law and professor of law at Monash University, has spoken of the “immediate and devastating” impact that the end of constitutional protections for abortion will have.
“This decision will disproportionately affect the poorest and most vulnerable who cannot travel to more liberal states to access abortion services,” Sifris said.
Protesters for abortion rights gather after Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe v. Wade and the right to federally protected abortion in San Francisco City Council on Friday, June 24, 2022. The Supreme Court has put an end to constitutional protections for abortion that had been in place for almost 50 years, a decision by his Conservative majority to overturn the court’s historic abortion cases. (Photo AP / Josie Lepe) (AP)
He said that as a result, the United States would see a “regression to the times of abortions in the backyard.”
“Women should not risk their health or their lives to access what the World Health Organization describes as one of the safest medical procedures,” Sifris said.
“Abortion is a human rights issue and should not be reformulated as a state rights issue.”
An explosion of protests erupts in the United States following the ruling on abortion rights
Dr. Shelly Makleff, a public health and preventive medicine research fellow at the Monash School of Global and Women’s Health, agreed that “the most vulnerable communities will be disproportionately affected.”
He said the sentence indicated “a massive setback”.
“The right to a critical health service is being withdrawn, with dire implications,” Makleff said.
“Unlike the era before Roe, we now have medical abortion as a safe option for self-management of abortion. The risks for abortion seekers will be increasingly legal in states that have criminalized abortion “.