The cost of injustice: When young lives are lost in the name of abortion bans
This piece was written by a member of our 2024-2025 RJ Cultural Catalyst cohort, Yasmeen Akbar.
To say that I am terrified in the world we live in today would be an understatement. Young women from all over, from Georgia to Texas, are losing their lives because of strict abortion bans. Their stories have left me, and many others, filled with fear and outrage. These women’s deaths weren’t inevitable — they were preventable. Instead, they are the result of laws that prioritize political ideology over humanity, restricting medical care to the point of fatality.
As a 24-year-old Black woman who resides in Georgia, I cannot help but to see myself in these women. They were daughters, sisters, friends — women whose lives were full of promise. Yet, their autonomy and health were deemed less important than adhering to an uncompromising set of rules.
Several stories haunt me but one in particular is that of Nevaeh Crain. While pregnant, Crain’s mother rushed her to the emergency room after having developed several concerning symptoms like vomiting and a fever. They visited three hospitals before someone recognized “fetal demise” from an ultrasound. Prior to that she was diagnosed with both strep throat and sepsis — a life threatening infection.
But just hours after her fetus was declared as in demise, her organs began to fail and she died at only 18-years-old.
This is our new reality. Where strict abortion bans are, pregnant people are not safe. “Pregnant women have become essentially untouchables,” Sara Rosenbaum told ProPublica.
Georgia and Texas are among the states that have enacted some of the most restrictive abortion bans in the country. In both states, abortion care is banned after just 6 weeks, before most people even know that they are pregnant. These laws have not only erased access to abortion for millions, but have created a chilling effect on medical providers, who fear prosecution for providing life-saving care. As a result, young women and pregnant people in desperate need of medical intervention are left to suffer, their lives slipping away much too soon because doctors are forced to hesitate.
28-year-old, Josseli Barnica laid in a hospital bed for 40 hours begging hospital staff to relieve her of the pain she felt while actively having a miscarriage. They denied her care because they had to wait until there was no longer a fetal heartbeat because offering to speed up her delivery or empty out her uterus could have been considered an abortion and that is a “crime.”
Denying her care resulted in her uterus being open to bacteria and led to her untimely and preventable death.
Preventable. Pregnant people are dying from completely preventable complications.
In Georgia, Amber Nicole Thurman was a completely healthy 28-year-old and aspiring nurse. After experiencing a very rare reaction to abortion pills, she had left over fetal tissue in her uterus and without removing it completely she would be susceptible to a fatal infection. And similar to Barnica, the hospital denied her care because performing what used to be a routine procedure would now be a felony.
According to ProPublica, an official health committee for the state declared that Thurman’s death was “preventable” and the hospital denying her care for so long played a “large” role in her passing.
This isn’t just about abortion; this is about the erosion of our fundamental right to health care and having control over our own bodies. It is about living in a society where young women like me must question whether our lives and our futures are valued enough to receive care in an emergency.
I wonder: where does this end? If the laws that govern us are willing to let us die in service of a political agenda, what does that say about our worth? How do we reconcile living in a country that claims to champion freedom, but denies us the freedom to live?
These laws disproportionately affect young people who are still finding their footing in life. We are a generation already navigating a world of uncertainty — climate change, economic instability and political unrest. Adding the fear of medical abandonment to that list isn’t only overwhelming, it’s infuriating.
We deserve better. Every person in need of abortion care deserves better. I wonder how long until these tragedies will serve as a wake-up call. We need our autonomy respected, laws that protect us and our voices to be heard on the issues that impact us.
To the women who have lost their lives, we owe it to them to fight for a future where stories like theirs no longer exist. To demand a world where the value of our lives is not up for debate.
