“Roe v. Wade”: Supreme Court reverses decision allowing abortion in the United States

The decision ends nearly half a century of abortion rights in the United States. It is a return to the situation that existed before 1973 when each state was free to prohibit or not the carrying out voluntary termination of pregnancy.

The Supreme Court of the United States reversed the decision that protected the right to abortion in the country, known as “Roe v. Wade”. The six Conservative judges voted in favor and the three Liberals voted against.

The constitutional recognition of the right to voluntarily terminate a pregnancy until the 24th week of pregnancy had taken place in January 1973, with seven votes in favor and two against. The decision became known as the “most controversial in the history of the Supreme Court”.

Reversing this decision will again allow states to ban abortion. Given the wide geographic and political divide over the issue, half of the states, especially in the conservative south and center, are expected to quickly ban the procedure.

Meanwhile, Missouri state attorney general, Republican Eric Schmitt, posted a photograph on Twitter signing the abortion ban. “This is a monumental day for the sanctity of life,” he described.

The Supreme Court’s deliberation follows a review of a case by a clinic in Mississippi that opposed state efforts to ban abortions after 15 weeks. Former President of the United States, Barack Obama, has already reacted, criticizing the “attack on the essential freedoms of millions of Americans”.

“Today, the Supreme Court has not only reversed a nearly 50-year precedent, but it has also relegated the most intensely personal decision anyone can make to the whims of politicians and ideologues,” Obama wrote on Twitter.

The Supreme Court was “remodeled” by former President Donald Trump, who had the opportunity to nominate three Conservative justices, solidifying the Conservative majority. Since September, the court has shown several signs in favor of abortion opponents: first, it refused to block the entry into force of a Texas law limiting the right to abortion to the first six weeks of pregnancy, as opposed to two trimesters under the current legal framework.

During a December review of a Mississippi law also questioning the legal deadline for abortion, most Supreme Court justices made it clear that they were prepared to alter or even completely overturn the principle established by “Roe v. Wade”.

“Millions of women in the United States will be affected by this decision, considering that the [most affected] are minorities and lower-class people”, warned in May – when the Supreme’s project was released – by the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, who described the matter as “disturbing”. “Unsafe abortion is the leading cause of maternal death,” she pointed out.