The state’s new law trusts patients and doctors—not politicians, police or prosecutors—to make deeply personal decisions throughout pregnancy.

This article was originally published by the Daily Hampshire Gazette,” Massachusetts finally decriminalizes abortion.”

Massachusetts law no longer imposes a gestational-age limit on abortion—meaning for the first time, a woman in the state can choose to end her pregnancy at any point, without a prosecutor looking over her doctor’s shoulder.

Gov. Maura Healey (D) last month signed the Prioritizing Patient Access to Care Act, joining nine other states—Alaska, Colorado, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon and Vermon, plus D.C.—in trusting patients and medical professionals to make abortion decisions throughout pregnancy, rather than politicians, police and prosecutors.

State Rep. Lindsay Sabadosa (D), colead sponsor of the bill, underscored the stakes for patients:

“Massachusetts has reaffirmed a fundamental principle: Medical decisions should be made by patients and their doctors, period. In a state with one of the strongest healthcare systems in the country, no one should be denied medically appropriate care because of arbitrary restrictions that cannot account for individual circumstances.”

Before this new law, Massachusetts had a 24-week gestational ban, with narrow exceptions. Rep. Sabadosa said the exceptions framework led hospital administrators and their attorneys to deny necessary medical interventions for fear of criminal or civil liability, forcing women to travel to Maryland, Washington, D.C., or New Mexico for care, resulting in delays, extra expenses and trauma for patients and their families.

“To ask someone to travel out of state in this political moment, it just feels wrong,” said Sabadosa. “By removing those barriers, we are ensuring Massachusetts remains a place where people can access the care they need, when they need it, without being forced to leave the Commonwealth.”

There are many reasons why people might need abortion care later in pregnancy.

According to the organization Patient Forward, which fights to destigmatize abortion later in pregnancy, people seeking later abortion care have often learned new information later in their pregnancy and then are delayed even further by barriers outside their control.

Sometimes women do not recognize they are pregnant because they are using contraceptives, their periods are absent or irregular, they are very young, they have no pregnancy symptoms, they are experiencing different symptoms from a past pregnancy or are subject to outside stressors. Sometimes their life is upended by a lost job, homelessness or the end of a relationship.

After they learn this information, they may experience barriers delaying access to abortion care, including obstructions to medical care caused by religious crisis pregnancy centers, difficulty finding providers offering later abortion care, conflicts with family members or partners, logistical obstacles like travel, childcare or time off from work or school, language barriers, parental consent requirements that cause delays, immigration status or probation restrictions limiting travel out of state, and/or difficulty raising money for a deductible or costs of an abortion that insurance won’t cover.

The people most likely to need later care are the ones already pushed to the margins—young, low-income and racially marginalized—who have always faced the steepest barriers to sex education, contraception and abortion.

In Massachusetts, the legislative hearings focused on women who experienced a severe fetal diagnosis or a threat to their own health and had to travel out of state for medical care, which are very sympathetic stories that were able to win over many supporters.

While it’s certainly important that states like Massachusetts have made later abortion more accessible to people experiencing health emergencies, the Prioritizing Patient Access to Care Act is important for everyone seeking later abortion care, whatever the reason.

Decriminalizing third-trimester abortion care in Massachusetts caps a decade of activism that began in earnest after the election of Donald Trump in 2016.

In 2018, the state adopted An Act Negating Archaic Statutes Targeting Young Women Act (the NASTY Women Act), repealing 19th-century laws criminalizing abortion in the first 24 weeks of pregnancy.

In 2020, the ROE Act created an affirmative right to abortion for the first time and lifted the parental-consent requirement for 16- and 17-year-olds.

In 2022, after Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization overturned the constitutional right to abortion, Massachusetts adopted a groundbreaking law shielding providers from civil and criminal liability for treating patients from states that ban abortion, including by telehealth—a critical avenue of abortion access for people living in states with bans.

Now Massachusetts has gone further still, decriminalizing third-trimester abortion, amidst skyrocketing criminalization of pregnancy in many states post-Dobbs.

Decriminalizing third-trimester abortions, eliminating parental consent for 16- and 17-year-olds, and nationwide telehealth abortion access are surely not what the architects of Dobbs anticipated, but they have awoken a sleeping giant: the rage of women, whose creativity, determination and courage are transforming the abortion landscape by increasing access and destigmatizing abortion.

Until women have bodily autonomy at all times—even in the third trimester of pregnancy, no questions asked—we will be second-class citizens, our lives, health and dignity endangered.

Women are worthy of respect and honor as the decision makers of our own lives. So, we will keep fighting for nothing less than full control over our lives and bodies.

Look to these trusted groups if you or a loved one needs to know more about reliable abortion care:

• A one-stop-shop for abortion seekers: I Need An A
• Other websites to explore all your options for abortion care: Plan C Pills, Abortion Finder
• Safe websites to buy abortion medication: Aid Access, Massachusetts Medication Abortion Access Project, Hey Jane
• If you need help affording abortion care, tell your telemedicine provider or contact an abortion fund near you.
• To protect your digital privacy when planning your abortion, click here.
• For free legal help as a patient or doctor, call If/When/How’s Repro Helpline—844-868-2812—or contact Pregnancy Justice.
• For medical advice, contact the Miscarriage & Abortion Hotline: 833-246-2632.
• If you need to know the abortion law in your state, look to the Center for Reproductive Rights. or Guttmacher Institute.

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A note from Ms. editors: We want to hear from you for The Majority, a new campaign collecting stories about how reproductive freedom has enabled readers to build the lives they want and need. Poll after poll shows a majority of Americans support reproductive healthcare access. Yet public debate overlooks the lives shaped by abortion access, contraception, IVF, miscarriage care, maternal healthcare or comprehensive sex education—countless women who chose to pursue an education, have children, not have children, protect their health and chart their own future. Add your voice and complete the sentence: “Access to reproductive choices gave me the freedom to….” Together, these stories will help show not only why reproductive freedom remains a majority value, but also what it makes possible.