The long-term impacts of the “global gag rule” are beginning to emerge as a major family planning provider projects that approximately 2 million women will be denied sexual and reproductive health services as a result of the order reinstated this time last year.

Marie Stopes International, which provides contraception and abortion services in 33 developing countries, has calculated it faces an $80 million funding gap as a result of the decision, which slashed 17 percent of its donor income.

Under the expanded version of the “global gag rule” introduced by President Donald Trump soon after his inauguration in January 2017, foreign NGOs that receive any United States global health assistance are prohibited from performing or promoting “abortion as a method of family planning.” That includes offering legal advice or counselling related to abortion.

“Unless we can fill the $80 million gap created by the global gag rule, it will deprive millions of women of the contraception they need to prevent an unintended pregnancy, and it is the world’s poorest women and girls who will bear the brunt,” Marjorie Newman-Williams, Marie Stopes International’s vice-president, said in a press release.

According to MSI, women in Africa will be hit hardest by the funding cuts, with some of the impacts already being felt. In Madagascar, MSI said it has already had to close a voucher program offering sexual and reproductive health services to poor women and adolescents, and warned that 22 outreach teams and 150 public sector franchises are also at risk of closure.

Read the full article about the impact to women's reproductive health by Sophie Edwards at Devex.