Abortion Access for Incarcerated Women: Are Correctional Health Practices in Confl ict With Constitutional Standards?

Does a pregnant woman who is in prison or jail still have the constitutional right to decide whether to continue her pregnancy or to have an abortion? The simple legal answer is yes. Of course, this provides little, if any, insight into what actually happens when thousands of women each year must make this decision while living behind prison walls. * But gaining such insight in any systematic manner has long presented a challenge to health professionals, re-searchers and advocates. The ways in which prisons handle a woman’s abortion request are often shielded from public scrutiny, and they can be enormously varied. Women are incarcerated at the federal, state and local levels. Accord-ingly, policies and practices of prison and jail offi cials, and the experience of pregnant women in their custody, may differ dramatically from state to state, county to county