Blog Series: SiX Repro’s ICYMI Research Roundup (December 2025 /January 2026 Edition)

SiX Repro’s ICYMI Research Roundup is a new regular update and short summary of recent sexual and reproductive health fact sheets, toolkits, and journal articles.  We bring you these latest and most relevant insights in the reproductive health, rights, and justice landscape to support state legislators in advancing evidence-based policymaking. These updates cover a wide range of reproductive health, rights, and justice topics, from abortion to contraception to maternal health to assisted reproductive technology and from the intersections of climate change or disability justice or gender affirming care and beyond. We value engagement from our state legislator community and invite you to join us as we explore these latest developments.

Special Highlights

• Contraceptive Access Efforts: Learning from Diverse Approaches and Informing the Future. This Contraception special issue shares findings and insights from contraceptive access efforts in the United States, including a commentary written by members of the SiX Reproductive Freedom and Health Equity Program team– “Bridging the gap: How SiX supports U.S. state legislators in transforming research into policy.’ The special issue is online and will be published in Volume 155 (March 2026 print edition).
• Regulation of Abortion Decision-Making Among Young People- Global Legal Comparisons Report (a collaboration between SiX Reproductive Freedom and Health Equity Program, the O’Neill Institute, and Legal Voice)
• SiX Brief on “Wastewater bills”: The purpose of this brief is to raise awareness about this trending anti-abortion strategy of weaponizing environmental concerns and the language to look out for in bills introduced in your state legislature. Additionally, messaging is provided in this brief that can be used to combat these bills.
• The policy briefs below, a collaboration between ANSIRH, ASCENT, IMPACT, and SiX Action, provide state-specific policy background and findings from the UCSF CHAT study on patients experiences using telehealth for abortion.
  • Alaska Policy Brief: Improving Access to Abortion Care in Alaska Through Telehealth
  • North Carolina Policy Brief:  Improving Access to Abortion Care in North Carolina Through Telehealth
  • Ohio Policy Brief: Improving Access to Abortion Care in Ohio Through Telehealth (Ohio Policy Evaluation Network)
  • Utah Policy Brief: Telehealth Abortion Care – Safe, Effective, and Essential for Utahns (in collaboration with Ascent Center For Reproductive Health)
  • Wisconsin Policy Brief: Improving Access to Abortion Care in Wisconsin Through Telehealth (in collaboration with University of Wisconsin CORE)

New Resources

• Communities Need Clinics (Abortion Care Network 2025 Report)

• Policy Analysis: Weaponizing Water– How the Campaign Against Medication Abortion Co-opts Environmental Policy (Guttmacher Institute)
• Policy Analysis: State Policy Trends 2025 Full-Year Analysis (Guttmacher Institute)
• Restorative Reproductive Medicine Resources (American Society of Reproductive Medicine)
• New analysis documenting how the Trump administration has further decimated domestic abortion access during his first year back in office. (Center for Reproductive Rights)

Blog Posts 

• Mifepristone: “The Moral Property of Women” Series (Ms. Magazine, January 2026):  Antiabortion politics in the U.S. have suppressed broader medical research and access—especially around mifepristone—and in doing so are withholding critical healthcare from women. Across three parts, “The Moral Property of Women” highlights how mifepristone’s potential to treat conditions like fibroids, endometriosis, cancer, and infertility is being stymied by political interference, and argues that reproductive autonomy—including access to safe, effective medications—must be defended and expanded.
  • Part 1: ‘The Moral Property of Women’: Mifepristone, Fibroids and the Stakes of Suppressed Science
  • Part 2:  Mifepristone Could Treat Endometriosis, Some Cancers, Depression and Chronic Illness—If Politics Didn’t Interfere
  • Part 3:  Who Controls Mifepristone? The Politics Blocking a New Era of Contraception

Fact Sheets

• Infertility Fact Sheet:  Black Maternal Health Statistical Insights (Black Mamas Matter Alliance): This resource examines how persistent barriers related to education, access, and referral pathways within the health care system shape infertility care experiences and outcomes for Black women and birthing people. Grounded in data and reproductive justice, the fact sheet situates infertility within the broader context of Black Maternal Health equity and outlines recommendations for policy, practice, and future research. BMMA invites advocates, policymakers, researchers, and community members to read, share, and use this resource in their work.

Research Briefs 

• Threats to Women’s Reproductive Freedom and Maternal Health (Institute for Women’s Policy Research, December 2025): This policy brief focuses on the impacts of the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” (OBBBA) on women’s reproductive justice and health equity, specifically on the issues outlined in Institute for Women’s Policy Research’s Promoting Access to Abortion and Maternal Health policy briefs. More than three years after the Supreme Court’s decision overturning Roe v. Wade, millions of women lack access to reproductive care and freedoms, and the Black maternal health crisis is worsening. The OBBBA’s cuts and restrictions to health care coverage programs will further compound these challenges. In addition to rising health care costs, the new law will have devastating impacts on the landscape of reproductive justice and health equity in the United States.

Research Report

• After Pregnancy Loss (Pregnancy Justice, January 2026):  This new report identifies and analyzes dozens of criminal laws across the country– many of them centuries-old– that govern how people navigate the aftermath of their miscarriages or stillbirth. The report also equips civil rights and criminal defense attorneys with the tools to fight these prosecutions and identifies opportunities for policy reform.  Pregnancy Justice has identified 58 prosecutions between 2006 and 2024 connected to how people navigated the aftermath of pregnancy loss, including the handling of remains from a miscarriage or stillbirth. Because of the difficulty in identifying cases and accessing court records, that number is an undercount. Key report findings include:
  • 18 states have laws that criminalize the non-reporting of pregnancy loss remains.
  • 10 states have laws that criminalize the transportation of pregnancy loss remains.
  • 19 states have laws that criminalize the disposal of pregnancy loss remains or classify these as “abuse of a corpse.”
  • 15 states have laws that criminalize the “concealment” of pregnancy loss remains.
  • At least 2 of these states have laws that criminalize the “concealment” of live births or stillbirths delivered out of wedlock.
  • 2 states have laws on the books that criminalize the “abandonment” of pregnancy loss remains.
  • 1 state has laws that criminalize the “possession” of pregnancy loss remains.

• First Year of the Trump-Vance Administration (Planned Parenthood Federation of America and Planned Parenthood Action Fund, January 2026):  This  report details the full scope of the Trump administration’s coordinated assault on sexual and reproductive health care in 2025. Planned Parenthood Federation of America and Planned Parenthood Action Fund also published new data on the consequences of the Trump administration’s policies on Planned Parenthood health centers and patients.  Read the fact sheet here and the policy report and executive summary here and here. Top Points:
  • This past year, the Trump administration and its backers in Congress have devastated access to sexual and reproductive health care, including patients’ ability to get care at Planned Parenthood health centers.
  • Nearly three-quarters of these closures were in underserved areas, primary care health professional shortage areas, or rural areas.
  • A majority of rural health center closures were in the Midwest, deepening existing inequities in access to care. In this area alone, health center closures have affected more than 24,600 birth control patients.

Journal Articles

• “You’re not necessarily pregnant”: Confusion about emergency contraception (SSM – Qualitative Research in Health, December 2025):  Misconceptions about what emergency contraception does are common and have resulted in policy efforts to restrict access. Understanding the beliefs and reasoning behind people’s uncertainty and lack of knowledge about emergency contraception helps shed light on key misconceptions and how advocates, providers, and researchers can improve clarity. Researchers conducted a secondary analysis using previously collected qualitative data from card sort and vignette activities focused on scenarios related to emergency contraception and if participants considered these scenarios abortions (N = 64). They identified three major themes related to participants’ classification of emergency contraception: uncertainty and pregnancy liminality; timing and mechanism of action; and the role of intention and overlap with medication abortion. This study demonstrates that people lack a consistent, coherent understanding of what emergency contraception does, which has implications for contraceptive access and service provision. Furthermore, these misconceptions can become politicized and undergird the rationale for restrictions on sexual and reproductive health care.

• Contraceptive autonomy of adolescents and young adults in the U.S. South: The influence of healthcare providers, partners, and parents (Social Science & Medicine, January 2026): A growing body of research describes coercive experiences in contraceptive care in the clinic setting, a phenomenon that disproportionately constrains the contraceptive autonomy of women who are young, low-income, Black, or Latinx, but there is less research on how other social influences may constrain contraceptive use and decision-making. Researchers examined contraceptive autonomy across three domains of interpersonal influence (healthcare providers, sexual partners, and parents) and by race (Black vs. White). They surveyed 1207 Black and White adolescents and young adults (AYAs) assigned female at birth living in five southern states. They found that over half of all respondents reported feeling social pressure related to their contraceptive use, and more respondents spoke with a sexual partner or healthcare provider than with a parent about contraception. Those who did speak with a parent were most likely to report contraceptive pressure. Furthermore, respondents who reported social pressure were less likely to be using their preferred method of contraception. Black (vs. White) AYAs were less likely to have conversations with healthcare providers and sexual partners about contraception; more likely to report social pressure across all interpersonal domains; and less likely to be using their preferred method. By examining social pressures beyond the clinic setting, these findings reveal the multifaceted and socially patterned ways that bodily autonomy is constrained for AYAs assigned female at birth and how this is magnified for Black AYAs.

• Adolescent and young adult women’s experiences of contraceptive coercion in healthcare interactions in the southern United States (Contraception, Published online December 2025): Contraceptive coercion during contraceptive counseling can limit pregnancy-capable individuals’ contraceptive autonomy over decision-making and use. Researchers examined the contraceptive counseling experiences of adolescent and young adult women for evidence of contraceptive coercion. This study involved individual interviews with a racially diverse sample of 46 adolescents and young adults, ages 16–24, assigned female at birth, and residing in one of five southern states. Their findings highlight how clinicians may circumscribe adolescent and young adult women’s contraceptive access and autonomy by how they discuss patients’ contraceptive options, especially when patients express interest in a non-hormonal prescription method. These interactions can inhibit patients’ ability to use their preferred contraceptive method.

• Barriers to abortion access for young southerners: a qualitative analysis of case notes from ARC-Southeast (BMC Public Health, December 2025):  Young people in the U.S. Southeast navigate a constellation of legal, systemic, and social barriers for abortion care. In this study, researchers identified and described barriers to abortion access experienced by young Southerners who sought abortion funding and the context they navigate to do so. They conducted a secondary qualitative data analysis of case notes from people ages 21 and under who resided in six Southeastern states and contacted ARC-Southeast for support between January 2017 and May 2021 (n = 2,278). The findings revealed young Southerners encounter a multitude of barriers addressed by abortion funds within four primary categories: structural barriers, financial barriers, personal barriers, and the COVID-19 pandemic. Researchers argue that abortion funds are uniquely situated among other key actors (e.g., health care providers, legal experts, other advocates, policymakers) and equipped to mitigate barriers that could otherwise deter and delay youth from obtaining abortion care and facilitate young people’s dignity and respect. This research highlights areas where such community-led and youth-centered efforts could be bolstered to address inequities in abortion access and other intersecting health and social systems.

Podcasts

• Immigrant Justice and Reproductive Justice: Raising Families with Safety and Dignity (the Population Institute, rePROs Fight Back, January 2026): In the U.S., a large proportion of immigrant communities remain unable to access healthcare. Latine people make up 41% of uninsured people in the country, and a large portion of that number reflects immigrant communities. Even before the fall of Roe v. Wade, Latine people, immigrants, and communities of color faced disproportionate barriers to abortion care. Criminalization, ICE raids, travel, and language barriers further deter immigrant communities from seeking abortion care. In this podcast episode, Lupe Rodriguez, Executive Director of the National Latina Institute for Reproductive Justice (NLIRJ), talks about how immigrant justice and reproductive justice intersect.

Webinars 

• Trust Black Women: Reproductive Justice Research in Action Panel (SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective, January 2026):  Featuring Monica Simpson (SisterSong), Dr. Noelle E. Spencer (SisterSong), Dr. Terri-Ann Thompson (Ibis Reproductive Health), Cicely Paine (Feminist Center for Reproductive Liberation), and Victoria Nichols (Free the Pill, Ibis Reproductive Health) this conversation highlights the Trust Black Women research study conducted by SisterSong, Ibis Reproductive Health, and the Feminist Center for Reproductive Liberation. Discussion of this groundbreaking study was the basis for an in-depth conversation about the importance of community-rooted approaches and the power of having Black women’s voices at the center of inquiry. Moderated by Nea Richard (SisterSong), this is an engaging and thoughtful discussion on how reproductive justice research can drive meaningful action and change.

We welcome your feedback on content and format. Are you a state legislator and have questions? You can reach out to Melissa Madera, Senior Associate of Research and Education, Reproductive Freedom and Health Equity Program, at melissa@stateinnovation.org.  If you’re a researcher or partner and want us to highlight your research, send materials to melissa@stateinnovation.org.