What Has and Hasn't Changed in the Last Four Years

So this next one is honestly like kind of scary to think about and talk about, but it's just the reality.

So it has to be done.

And that is that pregnancy in Oklahoma has become more dangerous.

Yes.

that stems from, I think a big piece is a lot of Oklahomans are feeling, you know, just in our conversations on behalf of repro 46, talking with Oklahomans, there's a lot of misinformation on what is still legal in Oklahoma.

Um, but pregnancy has, has become dangerous because we believe politicians have interfered a bit too much in, um, laws regarding women's reproductive health.

And it's, as you know better than anyone, starting to affect women and families and women who are experiencing things like ectopic pregnancies, miscarriages, and women who are pregnant but might not even understand fully what their access is and what is available to them.

So I think a big part of that piece is just misinformation and not understanding because our laws are vague and therefore dangerous.

And it also kind of rolls into something that I've heard recently.

you guys mentioned, which is that fewer doctors are coming to our state where we already experience counties that are just, they don't have any more, or sorry, maternal care already.

And now we're even losing that more.

Is that correct?

Yes.

Yeah.

So Association of American Medical Colleges, they've been tracking residency applications since Dobbs.

And I think it was the 2023 to 2024 application cycle, the people who are actually applying to residency programs in states with abortion bans fell 4.2%.

So I think that's really interesting to see that, you know, people are not wanting to come here, like people aren't wanting to practice here.

And, you know, it doesn't mean that there's suddenly no doctors in banned states, but that trend is really important because, uh, where physicians train and ultimately practice is usually where they want to start, you know, um, practicing in the long term.

So I think it's really interesting to see that.

It feels like a hit that doesn't,

you can't quickly recover from that.

These physicians are choosing to go and, you know, start their own family, start their own lives and plant roots and wherever they are going to residency.

And so, you know, even if and when hopefully this, these laws kind of ease up a bit, I guess we could say, doesn't mean they're going to turn around and just run, you know, uproot themselves and run right back.

So I would imagine it's something that we're going to see the effects of for a very long time.

Absolutely.