Reproductive Justice During COVID-19 and Beyond: Comparative Perspectives on Law and Policy in India and the United States
State responses to COVID-19 have revealed that many national governments are not prioritizing access to safe abortion and other reproductive health care services, despite their vital importance to ensure the well being of all persons. In this May 15, 2020 webinar, Professor Dipika Jain and Payal Shah offered comparative perspectives on reproductive justice in India and globally, in the context of COVID-19 and beyond the pandemic. In a new article just published in the Columbia Journal of Gender and Law, the speakers examine the transformative potential of jurisprudence from the Indian Supreme Court on reproductive rights. They argue that it is critical for the judiciary to move beyond privacy-based arguments and incorporate a comprehensive equality-based analysis that accounts for the impact of gender, caste, indigeneity, age, and socioeconomic status. The COVID-19 pandemic has brought to light deep-rooted inequalities in access to healthcare services, in India and other countries. In these circumstances, restrictions on access to abortion disproportionately impact marginalized persons, making it imperative for law and policy-making to adopt an equality analysis in their approach.
