Hello everybody, I am jumping in here with quite a serious fair dues warning. Today we are talking about the overturning of Roe v Wade and the history of abortion in America.

This can obviously be quite a tough subject so this is just your heads up that that's what we're talking about. Adult themes will be covered some distressing content and if that's not for you then please just give this one a miss.

On the 24th of June 2022, the US Supreme Court overturned the 1973 ruling known as Roe v Wade, meaning that after 50 years of being able to access abortion many women now no longer have that right.

This is an incredibly difficult time for women who have lost this right but it isn't the first time that it's happened.

Today betwixt the sheets, I'm joined by Leslie Regan to look at the first time that abortion was made illegal in America which was in the late 19th century.

We're going to be talking about what that meant for women then, how that campaign started and what women had been doing to access abortions up to that point. Let's begin.

So hello to Leslie J. Regan, thank you so much for joining me today. Great to be here, thanks for having me.

No, it's my pleasure. I'd love to say that we met under happier circumstances but the current discussion that we're going to have is a really heavy one and I'm so grateful that this historians like you doing the work that you're doing around this.

I mean, what's it like in the state at the moment? What's your reaction to the initial overturning of Roe v Wade?

Well, we knew it was coming but it's just awful. It's very distressing. I live in Illinois which is a state that has passed a reproductive health care act and is making sure that people know it's legal and that they're welcome to come to Illinois.

But you know, everybody can't travel and I'm just very concerned for the suffering that has already begun and that it's going to get worse.

It's very chaotic for people. Yeah, that's a good word for it. Like I'm in the UK, I'm on the other side of the pond to you guys and and we still felt it here.

Like those collective, I suppose intake of breath and fear about what this means, what precedent this sets and I think that that felt the world over actually.

Yeah, that makes sense. I mean, the movements to criminalize and legalize abortion have been related and we look around at the rest of the world and the legalization in the US and England were related when abortions became available in England.

Many people traveled to the UK from the United States and Canada. Obviously that was incredibly expensive and difficult. So only a few people could do it. But people did and there was a lot in the press about, oh my god, there's so many women coming here. We have to stop them.

And when I see that other countries are moving to legalize abortion like Mexico and Ireland, I like you and very glad for people there and see that as a victory for women's rights.

And their health and to see this go backwards is very, very frightening and upsetting.

It just seems like such an enormous step back. And from the outside looking in, it's like America is this like colossal giant, you know, of guys.

What do you, I suppose that's the fear is like if America can do this, if it's going to happen in America in 2022, then where else can this happen?

It's very scary. It's really scary.

Yeah. Well, of course, we have a different political system.

You just had a prime minister resign under pressure and we had a very similar leader where that didn't happen and the party supports him.

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