How a network of abortion pill providers works together in the wake of new threats

When the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in March about restricting access to the abortion drug mifepristone, Elisa Wells, co-founder and co-director of Plan C, was ready.

Plan C, an information resource that connects women to abortion pill providers, almost immediately saw a spike in searches for the medication.

With Florida’s Supreme Court paving the way for the state’s six-week abortion ban, Wells says she’s expecting even more search activity and more creative thinking from providers.

“When these egregious decisions happen, first, they cause harm,” she says. “And the second thing that happens is people get organized and mad and take action.”

Since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in its 2022 Dobbs decision, upending abortion access in the U.S., a network of abortion providers has sprung into action, weaving an abortion safety net across the country even as the procedure has been effectively banned in 15 states.

Providers such as Aid Access, Hey Jane and Just the Pill operate both within and outside the established health care system — including mailing abortion medications to women in states with bans, setting up mobile clinics and offering financial assistance — often staying in close contact with one another.

Many of those efforts center on access to abortion medication by mail, which the Food and Drug Administration made fully legal in 2021, creating a sort of “sisterhood of the traveling pill” that keeps groups connected as new restrictions on abortion arise.

Wells says Plan C called different providers for a meeting on how best to pivot in the changing abortion landscape.

“We had meetings where we introduced the providers to one another,” she said. “All of these groups that normally would be