Thread by @amylittlefield

For @thenation, I spoke with patients, abortion funds, and clinics nationwide about how abortion access during COVID almost flickered out. 🧵💕
thenation.com/article/societ…

Patients encountered locked doors, limited services, and state attempts to ban abortion under the guise of preserving PPE.

Abortion funds like @IWRising @WHOohio @lilithfund @JENSouthDakota @TBAF7 @FundTexasChoice @nmrcrc engaged in quiet acts of heroism to get people care.

Still, many people could not get the care they needed.

“If I’m being honest, some teens during the abortion ban did end up continuing pregnancies that they didn’t want to continue, because it was just impossible for them to get care,” @reprorose of @janesdueprocess told me.

The pandemic also shifted how people get abortions.

Many bought pills overseas or from a new slate of digital abortion clinics.

In online forums, @Abortion_Squad and @aBigMess were there to help them navigate this new landscape.

But with more states moving to ban telemedicine abortion, @robinmarty told me she worries that options will grow in some states and shrink in others.

“We are truly going to have the most inequitable system, even more so than we do now," she said.

My main takeaway is this: Abortion funds move mountains.

I spoke with folks who drove strangers for hours through the South Dakota cornfields and the Florida Everglades, who coordinated private AIRPLANE trips to pick people up and fly them to clinics. (I'm looking at @rlorenxo)

As Yamani Hernandez of @AbortionFunds told me, however, abortion funds are also "a very precarious network.” And they don't have nearly enough funding to get everyone the care they need.

Support your fund here: abortionfunds.org

Also: A MASSIVE shoutout to @AbortionStories for connecting me with Larada Lee.

“Being Black in the middle of trying to seek an abortion in the middle of a pandemic—it was really difficult to navigate all of those feelings," she told me.