Health

A Catch-22 for Survivors of Domestic Violence: Trump Admin Simultaneously Slashes Housing and VAWA Funds

PUBLISHED 1/23/2026 by

Federally underfunded programs that support survivors of domestic violence have struggled to provide services for years. Now, the Trump administration’s budget bill threatens to sever the last lifelines many women’s shelters were clinging to: funding for the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Continuum of Care programs. 

Thanks to callous indifference from Republican lawmakers, obliterating women’s emergency services will leave the blood of women and children across the nation on their hands. In the U.S., domestic violence is typically treated with band-aid solutions rather than infrastructural change that would decrease need for places like shelters—something most lawmakers have never relied on themselves.

Who Controls Mifepristone? The Politics Blocking a New Era of Contraception

PUBLISHED 1/22/2026 by

Mifepristone “works against endometriosis. It works against myoma [fibroids]. We are now involved in a study group that looks at whether it can prevent breast cancer,” says pioneering reproductive-health advocate Dr. Rebecca Gomperts. “It has so many potential uses, and it hasn’t been [developed].

“If we as women don’t make sure that it becomes available to meet our needs … then it won’t happen.”

This is the final installment of a new series, “The Moral Property of Women: How Antiabortion Politics Are Withholding Medical Care,” a serialized version of the Winter 2026 print feature article.

Abortion Access Can’t Depend on Rage Donations

PUBLISHED 1/21/2026 by and

Now, almost three and a half years after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, the numbers are clear that abortion in the U.S. has, to the shock of most, continued to rise. But we also have data showing that a small but not trivial number of people are continuing their pregnancies to birth due to abortion bans. To us, what this shows is clear: that overturning Roe has prompted ingenuity, persistence, and resistance among providers and patients but is also leaving many people behind. Ultimately, this is no way to deliver healthcare.

The provision of healthcare—and abortion is healthcare—must be publicly supported in order to be equitable and accessible. When this assistance relies on inconsistent large-scale private donations, as well as the almost-supernatural work of abortion providers and supporters, it’s no wonder that some people are slipping through the cracks, even while abortion numbers are rising.

Women Are Being Priced Out of Health Coverage—and Congress Knows It

PUBLISHED 1/21/2026 by

With the 2026 Affordable Care Act (ACA) open enrollment period now closed, millions of Americans are facing an uncomfortable new reality: higher monthly costs for the health coverage they already struggled to afford.

When health insurance becomes unaffordable, women don’t just absorb the cost. They make sacrifices—often at the expense of their health. They end up skipping preventive services, delaying medical tests, forgoing mental healthcare, and leaving prescriptions unfilled. The consequences can be severe: delayed diagnoses, worsened health outcomes, poorer quality of life, and higher costs down the road for families and the health system.

Unable to wait for Congress to act to extend the credits, the vast majority of Americans have already made their health insurance decisions for 2026. With the enrollment deadline passed, women have had to make decisions based on what they can afford right now—not on promises that may never materialize.

Mifepristone Could Treat Endometriosis, Some Cancers, Depression and Chronic Illness—If Politics Didn’t Interfere

PUBLISHED 1/21/2026 by

Across a range of conditions that disproportionately affect women, research into mifepristone’s potential has been slowed, defunded or blocked altogether. Nowhere is that clearer than in the treatment of endometriosis and other serious illnesses that leave millions of women in chronic pain.

Endometriosis—when endometrium cells grow outside the uterus—afflicts an estimated 10 percent of reproductive-age women. It can lead to chronic pelvic and back pain, heavy or abnormal bleeding, pain during sex or bowel movements, fatigue, bloating, digestive issues, infertility, anxiety and depression.

Mifepristone can help—it blocks the progesterone causing the cellular growth and decreases the size of existing endometrial lesions, thereby relieving painful symptoms. But antiabortion politics have obstructed the development of the medication for these uses in the U.S.

Researchers have also produced studies showing mifepristone is effective for treating ovarian and breast cancer, chronic inflammatory diseases, and several psychiatric disorders, including major depressive disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and psychotic depression.

This is Part 2 of 3 in a new series, “The Moral Property of Women: How Antiabortion Politics Are Withholding Medical Care,” a serialized version of the Winter 2026 print feature article.

‘The Moral Property of Women’: Mifepristone, Fibroids and the Stakes of Suppressed Science

PUBLISHED 1/20/2026 by

Despite mifepristone’s broad medical promise, its development has been repeatedly stymied by abortion opponents who fear wider availability would weaken their attempts to suppress abortion access.

More than 26 million women in the U.S. are affected by fibroids, which are noncancerous growths of the uterus that can reach the size of a grapefruit or larger. Treatment too often defaults to invasive surgery, either removing the fibroids or performing hysterectomies.

In China today, a three-month regimen of 10 milligrams per day is the approved protocol for treating fibroids. Meanwhile, American women still do not have access to this very effective nonsurgical treatment.

This is Part 1 of 3 in a new series, “The Moral Property of Women: How Antiabortion Politics Are Withholding Medical Care,” a serialized version of the Winter 2026 print feature article.

As Wisconsin Democrats Push First-Ever Pregnancy Loss Protections, State Republicans Advance Embryo ‘Personhood’

PUBLISHED 1/17/2026 by

In late 2025, Wisconsin Senate Republicans passed SB553, a bill that defines embryos, fertilized eggs and fetuses as “unborn children” and “human beings” from the moment of fertilization. The bill passed with the support of every Republican senator and opposition from all Democrats. SB 553 also attempts to redefine the word “abortion,” asserting that a termination performed to prevent the death of a pregnant woman is not an abortion if it is not “designed or intended to kill the unborn child.”

Doctors also warn that SB 553 quietly functions as a personhood law by stating that once an egg is a human being from the moment of fertilization. By granting fertilized eggs status as human beings, the bill is giving those eggs legal rights which are equal to those of their pregnant mothers. While Gov. Tony Evers has said he will veto the bill if it reaches his desk, Wisconsin state Sen. Kelda Roys says its passage reveals Republican lawmakers’ intent.

Roys recently introduced the Pregnancy Loss Protection Act, the first bill of its kind in Wisconsin. Its goal is to prevent overzealous prosecutors or law enforcement officers from targeting people who experience miscarriage or stillbirth, while also pushing back against a broader Republican effort to confer legal personhood on embryos from the moment of fertilization.

Keeping Score: Renee Good Fatally Shot by ICE; Women Work Longer and Are Paid Less Worldwide; N.Y. Fights Back Against Federal Childcare Freeze

PUBLISHED 1/15/2026 by

In every issue of Ms., we track research on our progress in the fight for equality, catalogue can’t-miss quotes from feminist voices and keep tabs on the feminist movement’s many milestones. We’re Keeping Score online, too—in this biweekly roundup.

This week:
—”We had whistles. They had guns,” said Becca Good, wife of Renee Good, who was killed in Minneapolis by ICE agent Jonathan Ross.
—In central Texas, five months after the Sandy Creek flooding, “many are still homeless, and only 36 percent of FEMA claims in our area have been approved,” said survivor Brandy Gerstner. “FEMA must be independent, fully funded and strengthened—because when it fails to function, real families pay the price.”
—Anti-Muslim and anti-South Asian hate increased around the election of NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani.
—The Department of Veterans Affairs announced new abortion bans.
—Meta has removed the social media accounts of dozens of reproductive health and LGBTQ groups.
—Women worldwide earn just a third of what men do when unpaid domestic labor is taken into account.

… and more.

Oscar-Shortlisted Film ‘Belén’ Exposes the Injustice That Helped Transform Argentina’s Abortion Laws

PUBLISHED 1/13/2026 by

Belén didn’t know she was pregnant until she miscarried in a hospital. She’d gone to the emergency room suffering excruciating abdominal pain. Instead of receiving care, she awoke from surgery handcuffed to her hospital bed and accused of having an illegal abortion.

This is the true story behind Belén, a powerful new Argentine film directed by, written by and starring Dolores Fonzi. It is based on the ordeal of a young woman from northern Argentina, chronicled in Ana Correa’s nonfiction book What Happened to Belén: The Unjust Imprisonment That Sparked a Women’s Rights Movement, the prologue of which was written by Margaret Atwood.

Despite a lack of evidence, Belén was charged with aggravated homicide and sentenced to eight years in prison.

After two years, Belén was freed, thanks to the legal work of activist and lawyer Soledad Deza and the sustained support of women’s organizations and women’s rights activists and movements, such as “Ni Una Menos” (Not One Less). Her case became a rallying cry for reproductive rights, with thousands taking to the streets under the banner #LibertadParaBelen (“Freedom for Belén”), paving the way for Argentina’s historic legalization of abortion in 2020.

Junk In, Junk Out: The Senate HELP Hearing Confirmed What We Already Knew About the War on Medication Abortion

PUBLISHED 1/13/2026 by , and | UPDATED 1/14/2026 at 12:43 P.M. PT

On Jan. 14, the Senate Health, Education, Labor & Pensions (HELP) Committee held a hearing deceptively titled “Protecting Women: Exposing the Dangers of Chemical Abortion Drugs.”

Rather than offering new evidence or legitimate oversight, the hearing played out exactly as reproductive health experts warned: a partisan exercise in recycling debunked claims, elevating junk science and laying the groundwork for further restrictions on the most commonly used abortion medication in the United States.

Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), a senior member and former chair of the HELP Committee, dismantled the premise of the hearing, calling out Republicans for using the committee to advance a political agenda rather than public health. “We all know this hearing is not about safety—it’s about banning abortion nationwide.”