DU students weigh in on the Colorado Reproductive Health Equity Act

Facilities such as Planned Parenthood will be allowed to continue reproductive health procedures no matter the Supreme Court decision. [Photo by Lauren Schmidt.]

Colorado Governor Jared Polis has signed House Bill 1279, also known as the Reproductive Health Equity Act, into law, making guaranteed access to reproductive healthcare procedures, including abortions, state law as of April 4. 

Access to safe and legal abortions has been an issue of much discussion recently, as the New York Times reported that the Supreme Court look to preside on the Dobbs vs. Jackson Women’s Health Organization case this summer that could overturn the landmark Roe vs. Wade outcome of 1973, removing the constitutional right to abortion. 

20-year-old DU student Sophie Van Winkle was clear about the potential consequences for women of Roe vs. Wade being overturned, should the Reproductive Health Equity Act not have been signed into law; “If there’s no access to legal abortions, women may resort to an unsafe abortion.” 

“It would be the moral thing to do,” explained Van Winkle, who admitted that she would not be psychologically or financially prepared to care for a child were she to become pregnant in the near future.

19-year-old Jennifer Wardeberg, also a DU student, said she was ’shocked’ by the potential overturning of Roe vs. Wade, calling it “a horrifying concept.” She too explained that in her current circumstances she would not feel able to raise a child, and so not having the option of an abortion if need be was not a situation she ever hoped to be in.

According to the Denver Post, this new bill does not permit state-funded abortions or allow them to be covered by insurance. Students seemed to be concerned about how this would affect low-income communities, with 19-year-old Lindsey Scheiner calling it “a horrible thing.” 

“One of the laws Colorado has in place is (access to abortion) if the woman or baby is at risk of health issues, so if health insurance isn’t covering that, then what’s the point of insurance?” said Scheiner. 

Wardeberg echoed Scheiner’s concerns; “it’s just giving more access to wealthy people to have that luxury when it’s actually a health issue,” said Wardeberg. 

Not only does the Reproductive Health Equity Act allow access to legal abortions, it also prohibits a fertilized egg, embryo, or fetus to have any rights under Colorado state law. Van Winkle was in full support of this too, explaining that “(women) don’t even have full autonomy over our bodies…there’s a lot of problems for minorities, immigrants, and women that need to be addressed way above the rights of a fetus.”

This sentiment wasn’t echoed by all her peers, however. 20-year-old Libby Herzog said that “fetuses should have a right to life.” Herzog went on to explain that she believed once an unborn child was at the fetal stage of development, its ability to survive outside of the womb makes it immoral to terminate that pregnancy. 

Herzog made it clear that this didn’t mean she opposed abortion, in fact she strongly emphasized her support of people having the right to choose what they do to their body and worried that “people will go to extremes to get an abortion if that is what they really need to do, which might kill them.” 

It seemed a general consensus among the students that women’s autonomy over their bodies was crucial. “The government shouldn’t have a say on a woman’s body,” said Scheiner. Her sentiment was reiterated by Van Winkle, who asserted that “men shouldn’t be in charge of ruling women’s bodies.”

All in all, the signing in of the Reproductive Health Equity Act appears to be a major comfort to the young women who could be most affected by the Supreme Court’s upcoming decision.