Physicians for Reproductive Health and the National Partnership for Women and Families published the following Issue Brief: Dobbs’ Erosion of the Health Care Workforce: Harms to Providers and Patients.
The Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization and extreme abortion bans and restrictions passed by states have had far-reaching impacts on health care providers and the communities they care for. Providers have been forced to shift the care or services they provide, relocate, or cease offering care altogether in response to restrictive state laws, the increasing threats of criminalization, and threats to medical licensures. Training opportunities in sexual and reproductive health for those in restrictive states have severely diminished and become even more difficult to access. And existing provider shortages have been exacerbated by these public policy decisions, as well as by multiple ongoing public health crises.
The Issue Brief features individual stories from PRH fellows from across the country and provides critical context and data to the experiences PRH’s provider network has been sharing both before and following the Supreme Court’s decision.