 Welcome to the People's Health Dispatch, People's Dispatches and People's Health Movement Health Newsletter. Today we are here to discuss a recent leak decision by the U.S. Supreme Court focusing on the raw weight ruling from 1973 and the implications of such a leak decision on access to abortion in the U.S. And today to talk to us is Lee Haynes who we met last time when we met to discuss what was happening with abortion care in Texas. Hi Lee and welcome, thank you for joining us again. Hi Anna, thanks for having me back. And yes so maybe we can just start with a bit of context so if you can tell us a bit more about what raw weight meant, why is it so important and what does it mean for access to abortion in the U.S.? Yeah so raw versus weight as you said was a case in the early 1970s that actually established the right to have an abortion. It was based on the court's reasoning was a right to privacy, the privacy that a woman has between she and her health care provider and that they can make that decision for her to have an abortion or I should say a person to have an abortion if they would like to have one. And so raw versus weight and then there's a follow-up case Planned Parenthood versus Casey which affirmed raw versus weight. So if those cases are overturned then the right to abortion in the U.S. at least as the constitutional grounded right would go away. Justice Alito's leaked draft majority opinion, it says that the right to abortion should be something decided by the populace meaning at least per some interpretations that it's something that should be decided by the people meaning through legislation so through the U.S. Congress or at state levels. Okay so and what would that mean in practice so when we say that you know abortion should be access to abortion should be regulated through legislation or it's brought back to state level. What kind of impact does that have on actual people wanting to access this kind of care? Yeah so I mean I think that what I think and what you know many experts and analysts are saying is that there would be varied rights to abortion between in the U.S. how we say red states and blue states which is you know more republican and then more democratic states. And so of course the right to abortion would mostly be gone in those red states for example like Texas where I'm from and the most threatening thing is that many states have what is referred to as a trigger ban on the books already so if this decision you know if this is the decision of the court that comes down in June or July when the opinions come out then these states will immediately or within 30 days whatever their law says outlaw abortion in its entirety. So in Texas where there's about six weeks ban the heartbeat ban there would be no abortion. I think Oklahoma may have a similar law, Louisiana might have a similar law and you know these are mostly states across the southern part of the U.S. and then that would leave people to try to go to the blue states to get an abortion. And so there is the kind of ripple effect or the collateral effect on people in blue states who you know have their right to abortion protected but then if there's an influx of folks who are coming from across state lines to get abortions in their states then there would kind of be this pressure on the health system there. And also something that the I guess if I can say anti-abortion states are trying to do is restricting what people can do in other states. So for example the state of Missouri has the law that at least it's not in force yet but it's in the works to where if someone goes to another state to get an abortion then that provider might be prosecuted. So yeah so there's a lot of threats to different aspects of abortion and people being able to get them or not and if they can get them or give an abortion then yeah everything is kind of crumbling. Yeah of course and I think also something that I mean comes across what you're saying is that you know even in the case that the the Supreme Court decision turns out to be the one that they bring out it's actually not going to close off access to abortion for everyone. So the women who are like rich and women who live in a specific part of the US will probably still have access to abortion care from different reasons. But on the other hand if we look at the southern states and people who cannot afford to travel even so they would be I'm guessing the most impacted by this kind of rolling okay. I just to add to what you say I one analyst is kind of suggesting that in for example four people who live in Texas the closest abortions might be a plane ride away and so like you say you know if you have to take off work can't afford a plane ticket or you know don't have a vehicle that can make it then you know you'll just be forced to carry a baby or resort to maybe you know more dangerous ways of getting an abortion and then there's also the the some women have consulted with for example nonprofits to be able to get medicine through the mail to be able to kind of have a self-managed abortion. So there is also the thinking that maybe more nonprofits including international nonprofits would be kind of filling in that gap for women even though the there's still the threat of prosecution for women who would you know use those services and get the medicine and give them or have their abortion at home. Yes yes so and that's yeah that's quite interesting to see that you know it's also quite I would say so basically it's very new news and we only heard about this like yesterday or a couple of days ago and it's it's been covered a lot so maybe what I was hoping to learn more from you is you know how do you see movements in the US reacting? We have seen a number of mobilizations across Latin America over the last few months you know really fighting for improving access to abortion so I was wondering if maybe we can expect something like that happening in the US or a specific take by the health movement for example. Yeah I mean I think yes there are already people in the health movement in the abortion rights reproductive rights movement at the Supreme Court building protesting that like decision and I think that you know we'll see what we saw earlier this year when the Texas ban came out if that was earlier this year maybe it was late last year but yeah and what I've been seeing is calls for Roe versus Wade to be codified into federal legislation so for the US Congress to take action but that's difficult because of the makeup of the Senate right now and getting enough votes and then there's also and I mean I guess this is a bit of a tangent but I think it's important there is also like people are thinking ahead to what other rights Roe falling might affect and the Roe versus Wade case the legal reasoning was based in the right to privacy like I said before and that same reasoning was used to grant rights to contraception to strike down anti-sodomy laws which basically outlawed homosexuality and also the right to intermarry which marrying outside of your race and so so all of these other rights that you know affect people's health are also under threat so there is a lot of you know solidarity across different movements to you know kind of say that we can't let you know Roe fall because then all these other rights might be affected thank you so much Lee yeah thank you