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A federal court judge has temporarily blocked one portion of North Carolina’s new abortion restriction law one day before it is set to take effect. The ruling, issued Friday afternoon by Judge Catherine Eagles, an Obama appointee, stops short of curbing the new limits to abortion after 12 weeks of pregnancy — changes passed into law this year by the Republican-led state legislature. Most of the law and ensuing clarifying amendments, passed this week, take effect on Saturday. Health care providers say they already are having an impact on patients. (Blythe, 6/30)

That measure, Planned Parenthood South Atlantic argued in a lawsuit against the state, makes it unclear whether providers are allowed to provide a medication abortion if it's too soon to tell whether or not the patient has an intrauterine pregnancy. State lawmakers passed legislation last week fixing numerous other provisions Planned Parenthood named in the lawsuit, and Gov. Roy Cooper signed those changes into law less than a day before Eagles' ruling. (Sherman, 7/3)

Vanessa was trying to get away from an abusive partner earlier this year when she found out she was pregnant. “Everybody kept saying, ‘Oh, you should just keep it.’ But then I was thinking of my future,” she said. “I thought of myself being, like, dirt poor and just struggling to raise this baby on my own. And I didn’t really want to do that.” Vanessa said her ex-partner was stalking her and she didn’t know what he was capable of. She decided to get an abortion. But abortion was banned in her state after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. With the help of a Planned Parenthood navigator, Vanessa came to Iowa. (Sostaric, 6/29)

Need Plan B? Tap your credit card and enter B6. Since last November, a library at the University of Washington has featured a different kind of vending machine, one that’s become more popular on campuses around the country since the U.S. Supreme Court ended constitutional protections for abortion last year. It’s stocked with ibuprofen, pregnancy tests and the morning-after pill. (Komenda and Haigh, 7/1)

Efforts to legalize and make abortions safer in Africa were shaken when the U.S. Supreme Court ended the national right to an abortion a year ago. Within days, Sierra Leone President Julius Maada Bio declared that his government would decriminalize abortion “at a time when sexual and reproductive health rights for women are being either overturned or threatened.” But some U.S.-based organizations active in Africa were emboldened, especially in largely Christian countries. One is Family Watch International, a nonprofit Christian conservative organization whose anti-LGBTQ+ stance, anti-abortion activities and “intense focus on Africa” led to its designation as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center. (Anna, 7/2)