COLORADO, USA — A Texas nonprofit is sounding the alarm on the impact their state's abortion ban is having on Black women.
"We are in a serious situation here in the state of Texas," Qiana Arnold, a Birth Justice Associate at the Afiya Center in Dallas, said. "It's just been a tragedy."
The Afiya Center is a nonprofit that's been pushing for reproductive rights for Black women for 15 years. Over the past few, that fight got harder.
"No one cares about Black women dying from maternal mortality," Arnold said. "And they should have access to the health care that they deserve to have. Abortion is health care."
According to the Centers for Disease Control, Black women have the highest abortion rate in the country.
The Afiya Center provides help with transportation and other needs for those looking to leave Texas to receive abortion care. According to data provided by the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, in 2023, about 19% of the abortions performed in Colorado were on Texans.
Arnold said Colorado is the top state they're sending people to.
"The system that has been put in place in the state of Colorado has proven itself to be the safest for receiving people coming from the state of Texas," she said.
Safety is what they're looking for. Black women are three times more likely to die from a pregnancy-related cause than white women. Of those who disclosed their race or ethnicity when seeking an abortion in Colorado, 19% of them were Black.
"I use that stat quite often, and I’m sure you guys are seeing an influx of numbers from the state of Texas," Arnold said. "Receiving states like Colorado have been amazing in this work."
Arnold describes the work done in Colorado as lifesaving when she thinks about what mortality numbers would look like if Colorado weren't so close.
"I know for a fact three different people that I have served over the past few months who had ectopic pregnancies or some other situation who were turned away," she said. "We would be losing lives at home."
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