Don’t the Lives of Women and Girls Matter?

When he returns to the White House, President-elect Trump is widely expected to slash funding for women’s health organizations around the world, and people on the left and the right alike are focused on what that means for abortions.

But the impact of any Trump cuts would go far, far beyond abortions, and would probably be devastating to millions of women and girls worldwide. Trump’s approach would reduce the availability of contraception and likely increase maternal mortality and cervical cancer.

When he was president in 2017, Trump framed similar cuts as “protecting life in global health.” But a study published by The National Academy of Sciences estimated that over Trump’s four years in office, this policy led to 108,000 deaths of children and mothers in poor countries.

So I wish Trump could meet some of the women and girls who will be collateral damage. They are people like a 16-year-old girl sitting forlornly on a hospital bed I met in Ambovombe, in the remote and impoverished south of Madagascar. The girl, Sambiasie (who has only one name), told me she and her boyfriend relied on an injectable contraceptive, costing her 40 cents every three months — and then she ran out of money.

“I didn’t have the money, so I missed an appointment,” she told me. For want of 40 cents, she became pregnant. Her boyfriend then dumped her. She had to drop out of school. Then she had a miscarriage.

You may be thinking: She was irresponsible to have sex if she couldn’t afford a contraceptive. True, of course. But were you ever young? It’s hard to see how less availability of contraception won’t mean more pregnancies, more girls dropping out of school, and probably more abortions as well.