Across the world, progress on gender equality, including access to abortion, is being rolled back, but activists continue to fight to protect these hard-won rights. During the 70th session of the Commission on the Status of Women, three human rights defenders from Burkina Faso, Poland, and the United States shared their strategies, experiences, and hopes for safeguarding abortion access despite increasing challenges.
Cécile Yougbare, an activist in Côte d’Ivoire, has spent 20 years advocating for women’s sexual and reproductive health rights, including access to safe abortions. She highlights the multiple challenges abortion rights defenders face, such as psychological and physical violence, stigma, restrictive legal frameworks, and funding restrictions. Her advocacy work combines community engagement, evidence gathering on maternal deaths, and simplifying legal language to frame abortion as a public health and human dignity issue. Yougbare is motivated by the stories of women who survive clandestine abortions and the hope of young women gaining autonomy over their bodies.
Kinga Jelińska, an activist originally from Poland, works with the international organization Women Help Women to expand access to self-managed abortion. She emphasizes that limiting abortion is rooted in politics, patriarchy, and stigma, often forcing people to resort to unsafe methods. Jelińska’s work focuses on autonomy, care, and solidarity, providing global online support and access to abortion medications. She stresses that safe abortion is a clear human rights issue and that advocacy must challenge criminalization, harassment, and restrictive systems.
Erin Grant, co-executive director of the Abortion Care Network (ACN) in the United States, describes the devastating impact of the fall of Roe v. Wade, which led to clinic closures and severely limited access, particularly for marginalized communities. ACN supports independent abortion providers by building community, sharing resources, and providing emotional support. Grant emphasizes that abortion access is a matter of bodily autonomy and essential human rights, comparable to access to water, food, and housing. She highlights the critical role of allies and organizations like Amnesty International in amplifying the work of abortion providers and framing reproductive care as a generational human rights effort.
Together, these activists demonstrate the global struggle for reproductive rights, highlighting strategies that combine advocacy, community-building, and practical support to protect abortion access and advance human dignity despite social, political, and legal challenges.
