Access Restricted: Abortion in Texas

Texas has passed some of the most restrictive anti-abortion laws in the US.

By September 2014, only six abortion clinics are expected to remain in a state that has 70,000 abortions per year.

Fault Lines travels to Texas to find out what is behind the legislation and how it is affecting women’s lives.

In this episode we meet a 23-year old woman named Melissa, who self-induces an abortion because she lives in an area of Texas that no longer has any abortion clinics.

She says it is a financial burden to travel 480 kilometres (300 miles) round-trip to reach the closest abortion clinic. Instead, Melissa travelled 30 minutes to Mexico, where she bought a medication called Misoprostol. It is normally used to treat ulcers, but she took it to end her pregnancy.

Fault Lines retraces Melissa’s steps to Mexico, to find out how a woman in her position could acquire Misoprostol without a prescription, and speaks with advocates on both side of the debate over access to abortions in Texas.