Dr Lucía Berro Pizzarossa

Constellations, Crises, and Care: the Role of Feminist Activism in Shaping Abortion Trajectories

Self-managed abortion - the use of pills outside of formal health systems - has challenged and changed understandings of safer abortion and who provides abortion care. The COVID-19 pandemic catalysed simpler, less medicalized models of abortion services—such as telemedicine—and brought to the fore the work of many organizations offering support and access to medicines in this way. Self-managed abortion has been recognized for its potential to contribute to personal agency and reproductive freedom and shift power away from institutionalized medical systems and into the hands of pregnant people.

This Fellowship will develop international research collaboration to understand the work of feminist actors working to support safe self-managed abortion during the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond. The project will contribute to the literature exploring the potential of self-managed abortion and the challenges it presents to the traditional medico-legal approach that underpins the conceptualization and regulation of abortion.