LAFAYETTE, KATC - Today marks two years since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe V. Wade, a groundbreaking decision that had rippling effects on women’s reproductive health across the nation.
Louisiana is among 14 states with a near-total ban on abortion, with a few exceptions including to prevent the death of a pregnant woman or when a woman is at a serious risk of impairment of a major bodily function.
“We need to continue to fight to keep the pro-abortion laws off the books and the pro-life laws on the books,” Brenda DesOrmeaux, Founder of DesOrmeaux Foundation said.
Brenda opened DesOrmeaux Foundation, a pro-life center in Lafayette nearly 25 years ago.
“Our main mission is to help mothers who are pregnant and are thinking about abortion to choose life,” she said.
She says the center has informed over 12,000 women and their families about the risks of abortion.
“We give counseling, we give free ultrasounds where they can hear the baby's heartbeat and see the baby in the womb, and 90% of the time after they’ve been counseled and got all the information they need and see that there’s a life there and then they will choose life,” she said.
Brenda says since the ruling her clientele has increased by 75%, averaging 200 women per month compared to 100. She says helping these women is possible through state funding, something they didn’t have before.
“Overturning Roe V Wade means abortion will not be available and that’s how it should be. Abortion should be illegal not legal because it’s killing a baby who has no defense, who is in the mother’s womb,” she said.
This polarizing decision has become a key political issue, galvanizing voters to the polls.
“This rule really impacts the lives of every Louisianian from here on out whether you want an abortion or not,” Louisiana Coalition for Reproductive Freedom Executive Director Victoria Coy said.
Louisiana Coalition for Reproductive Freedom is a statewide alliance of organizations and individuals that work to ensure sexual and reproductive health, rights, and justice for all people.
The organization works across state advocating for policy state while engaging with elected officials, and mobilizing communities around reproductive health.
Victoria says these restrictions are an attack on the body’s autonomy.
“It really isn’t just abortion access or access to that specific medical procedure. It’s an attack on IVF. These are families who desperately want to have children and the Louisiana laws are making it so much harder for them to do that,” she said.
She says the infringement on women’s reproductive rights has been a difficult pill to swallow.
“Our members have been at the frontlines for this headline grabbing attack on bodily autonomy. It’s been tough and not just on abortion access. Today is the anniversary of the most historic rollback of individual rights America has ever seen since its founding but also the repercussions of that,” she said.
