NAPW's Work

In February 2018, Ms Roberta Baker, a mother in St. Francois County, Missouri who lost her baby around 24 hours after giving birth, was charged with felony child abuse and neglect. Ms. Baker did not receive health care during her pregnancy and birth because she did not have a health care provider she could access or trust.

National Advocates for Pregnant Women and If/When/How wrote and organized a letter sent to the FDA, signed by organizations and experts in reproductive health and rights, public health, harm reduction, and HIV/AIDS. The letter opposes the recent warning letters targeting mifepristone and misoprostol as dangerous, and urges the FDA to remove the REMS for mife.

NAPW Executive Director Lynn Paltrow chaired a panel at this year’s Harm Reduction International Conference (HR19) on “Women’s Empowerment”, with panelists Jade Boyd, Darla Matyushina-Ocheret, Aura Rolg and Isadora Simoes de Souza. The conference took place in Porto, Portugal, and brought together advocates and activists from around the world to connect around a shared commitment to harm reduction.

NAPW Senior Staff Attorney Aarin Williams was featured on the 5/19/19 episode of CNN’s “United Shades of America” hosted by W. Kamau Bell. This episode, “Body Politics”, focused on reproductive rights and justice in Jackson, Mississippi, and Aarin grounded the episode in a discussion of intersectionality, reproductive justice, and maternal health.

NAPW Senior Staff Attorney Amber Khan and Director of Legal Advocacy Nancy Rosenbloom attended and spoke at this year’s American Bar Association National Conference on Parent Representation in Washington, D.C. in April 2019. This conference “is designed for advocates who focus on parent advocacy in the child welfare system”, including many parent defense attorneys from around the country.

National Advocates for Pregnant Women (NAPW) and Birth Rights Bar Association (BRBA) are hosting a monthly webinar series featuring topics related to birth justice, reproductive justice, maternal health, and the law. During Black Maternal Health Week in April 2019, BRBA and NAPW co-sponsored a webinar entitled: “Racism, Obstetric Violence and Black Women’s Bodies”, with panelists Aarin Williams (Senior Staff Attorney at NAPW), Colleen Campbell, JD, Chinyere Oparah, PhD, and Oneika Bogle, that discussed the various ways Black women experience force and coercion related to pregnancy and childbirth.

On May 31, 2019, National Advocates for Pregnant Women (NAPW), along with Movement for Family Power and 20 non-governmental organizations, activists, public defense offices, academics, and others who work every day to advance the human rights of pregnant and parenting people submitted a set of recommendations to the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women regarding the United States child protection and foster system.