Today in America, approximately 1 in 4 women will have an abortion before the age of 45. Trans men and nonbinary people have abortions too, though their experiences are rarely reflected in statistics. There are no abortion services in at least 90% of U.S. counties. Only a handful of states offer abortion services after the first trimester, and now with Roe v Wade overturned, the barriers to getting an abortion will only get worse. Later abortion patients often become the target of political misinformation and attacks and bear the bulk of harassment.
In ‘Someone You Know’, we meet 3 women – Mindy Swank, Valerie Peterson and Sharon Lagos – who have had abortions later in their pregnancies. Making the decision to use their real names and faces, each of the women share their complex, heartbreaking and frustrating stories of having to overcome numerous barriers to get the care they needed, at a time in America when reproductive freedom is being rolled back at an alarming pace.
