Bodily Autonomy, Reproductive Justice, and Tear Gas with Asha Hassan

In this episode, Kirk and Amelia speak with Asha Hassan, MPH, a doctoral candidate at the University of Minnesota School of Public Health. Together, they discuss her recent work on the link between exposure to tear gas during the 2020 protests for racial justice and consequent reproductive health issues. Asha explores the lack of sufficient policy innovation about banning chemical agents in protest settings as well as how systemic racism and ableism lead to patterns of healthcare underutilization. They also discuss the intersection of structural racism, disability justice, and abortion access. Asha identifies the legal challenges that the Dobbs decision poses to healthcare providers and how these legal challenges exacerbate the racial, ableist and classist barriers to abortion and all elements of reproductive justice. Asha encourages listeners in the wake of the Dobbs decision to consider Latin America’s recent reproductive justice wins as an example of successful grassroots, consensus- building and community-led change, urging us to consider policy that moves beyond Roe v. Wade to frame reproductive justice through the lens of bodily autonomy particularly for those who are most marginalized.

Mentioned articles:

https://bmcpublichealth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12889-021-10859-w#:~:text=Conclusion,often%20led%20to%20healthcare%20utilization

https://carhe.umn.edu/research-library/more-tears-associations-between-exposure-chemical-agents-used-law-enforcement-and

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9836943/

Asha Hassan is a doctoral candidate at the University of Minnesota School of Public Health in the Center for Antiracism Research for Health Equity who focuses on reproductive health equity, abortion access and policy, and police violence as a manifestation of structural racism. She was named a Society of Family Planning Emergent Scholar in 2020 and a National Birth Equity Research Scholar in 2021. Asha’s current doctoral research focuses on analysis of the relationship between racism and abortion access in Minnesota, and she hopes to continue working on issues of disability justice with a focus on community and provider education.