Woman in the U.S. Was Denied Medication for Being of ‘Childbearing Age.’ She Just Sued the Hospital.

New York resident Tara Rule's neurologist told her that a medication could cause birth defects to a hypothetical fetus.

In a similar example of post-Roe concerns around the mere possibility of pregnancy impacting people’s access to medication, several people who could become pregnant have reported being denied sometimes life-saving medications that are deemed “abortifacients” by doctors and pharmacists. Even before Roe was overturned, in 2021, a pregnant woman in Alabama was arrested and prosecuted for trying to pick up pain medication from her pharmacist to manage a chronic back condition, as police alleged she was endangering her pregnancy. Rule told Jezebel she’s heard from “people who say they were denied everything from acne medication to chemotherapy for the same reason.”

Rule’s case shows how the notion of fetal personhood—an ideology that regards embryos as separate people with rights at odds with the pregnant person’s—can be taken even further, said Dana Sussman, deputy executive director at Pregnancy Justice (which isn’t working on Rule’s case). “What we’re seeing is how this ideology can extend beyond pregnancy itself—the idea that if you can even become pregnant, then you can no longer make decisions about your own body or access medical care,” Sussman says.