Voters in Ohio will likely decide if the state’s constitution should enshrine the right to abortion care, after abortion rights advocates collected tens of thousands of signatures on a petition to put the issue on ballots this fall. If certified, those 710,000 signatures – roughly 300,000 more than required by state law – will place a proposed constitutional amendment asking whether “every individual has a right to make and carry out one’s reproductive decisions.” A statewide vote for abortion protections follows a wave of anti-abortion laws in the aftermath of the US Supreme Court’s decision to strike down a constitutional right to care last year. More than a dozen states, mostly across the entire US South, have effectively outlawed most abortions. But the Supreme Court decision to overturn the half-century precedent under Roe v Wade also fuelled efforts to protect abortion rights across the country, including in neighboring Michigan and Kentucky, where voters in both states voted to support abortion rights in ballot measures last year. After the Supreme Court’s ruling, Ohio lawmakers swiftly outlawed most abortion after roughly six weeks of pregnancy, a law that is currently suspended by a state court injunction but could be reinstated by the Ohio Supreme Court. A vote to enshrine abortion rights in the state’s constitution would effectively overrule any such law. Abortion rights advocates and providers have warned that Ohio’s ban, which does not include exceptions for pregnancies from rape or incest, ignited a healthcare crisis that endangered patients and their families across the state, forcing people to seek care hundreds of miles out of state and navigate complicated legal and medical minefields while experiencing pregnancy complications. The petition launched by Ohioans for Reproductive Freedom and Ohio Physicians for Reproductive Rights will head to the secretary of state, which has until 25 July to determine the validity of the signatures. The campaign launched with an open letter on 7 July of last year signed by hundreds of physicians rejecting the state’s anti-abortion law. “Over the past year, support for the amendment has grown exponentially thanks to our partners at [Ohioans for Reproductive Freedom], the thousands of volunteers who gathered signatures in communities across the state, and the hundreds of thousands of people who added their names to our petitions,” according to a statement from Dr Lauren Beene and Dr Marcela Azevedo, co-founders of Ohio Physicians for Reproductive Rights. “Today, the message we and they are sending is loud and clear: ‘let the people decide,’” they said. The campaign will magnify the role of Ohio – a state that voted for Donald Trump by more than 8 percentage points over Joe Biden in 2020 – in the 2024 presidential campaign and the renewed battle for abortion rights surrounding it, as Republican candidates and members of Congress weigh federal legislation that would outlaw or severely restrict abortion access nationwide. President Biden and Democratic candidates have signalled the central role that abortion rights protections will play in upcoming campaigns, alongside their warnings of a GOP-controlled White House and Congress legislating on abortion at the national level. Last year, a record number of voters in Kansas – a state that Mr Biden lost by more than 15 percentage points in 2020 – turned out for an election to reject a Republican-drafted amendment that would strip abortion rights from the state’s constitution, the first test for abortion rights put directly to voters after the ruling in Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization. That measure was shot down by nearly 20 percentage points, sending a resounding message that underscored the immense unpopularity of the Supreme Court’s decision. The president has repeatedly invoked that election victory in remarks supporting abortion rights in the months that followed, stating that the Supreme Court “practically dared women in this country to go to the ballot box and restore the right to choose,” and that anti-abortion lawmakers vastly underestimated how Americans would respond. Following the outcome in Kansas, Mr Biden pointed to the justices’ own writing in the Dobbs decision: “Women are not without electoral or political power.” “They don’t have a clue about the power of American women,” he said. “In Kansas, they found out women and men did exercise their electoral political power with a record turnout.” Read More Man sentenced to life in prison for rape of 10-year-old girl in Ohio abortion case that drew national attention Senator who once worked at a Planned Parenthood warns that Republicans are planning a national abortion ban One year after Roe v Wade fell, anti-abortion laws threaten millions. The battle for access is far from over

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Doing yoga may help reduce frequency of seizures in people with epilepsy and lower their anxiety, a new study found. The practice may also improve patients’ overall quality of life by reducing the stigma they feel from having the disease, according to the research, published last week in the medical journal Neurology. “People with epilepsy often face stigma that can cause them to feel different than others due to their own health condition and that can have a significant impact on their quality of life,” study author Manjari Tripathi from All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in New Delhi said. “This stigma can affect a person’s life in many ways including treatment, emergency department visits and poor mental health,” Dr Tripathi explained. In the study, researchers assessed people with epilepsy with an average age of 30 in India. They measured stigma among participants based on their answers to questions such as: “Do you feel other people discriminate against you?” “Do you feel you cannot contribute anything in society?” and “Do you feel different from other people?” About 160 people who met the criteria for experiencing stigma were then identified. These patients had an average of one seizure per week and on average took at least two anti-seizure medications, researchers said. One set of patients were then randomly assigned to receive yoga therapy, which included exercises in loosening muscles, breathing, meditation and positive affirmations. Another set of patients received a sham therapy that mimicked the same exercises, but these participants were not given instructions on two key components of yoga – slow and synchronized breathing, and attention to the body movements and sensations. Both the groups received seven supervised group sessions of 45 to 60 minutes over three months. They were also asked to practice sessions at home at least five times a week for 30 minutes and track their seizures and yoga sessions in a journal. Participants were then followed for an additional three months after their first three months of therapy. People who did yoga were more than four times as likely to have their seizure frequency more than halved after six months than the people who did sham yoga, the study found. Compared to those who did the sham practice, participants who did yoga were more likely to reduce their perceived stigma of the disease, researchers say. People who did yoga were also over seven times more likely to no longer have seizures than those who did the sham practice, according to the study. Researchers also reported a significant decrease in anxiety symptoms among those who did yoga versus people who did not. “The intervention group showed significant improvement in symptoms of anxiety, cognitive impairment, mindfulness and quality of life relative to the control group at the end of follow-up period,” researchers wrote. “Yoga may not only help reduce stigma, but also improve quality of life and mindfulness. Plus, yoga can be easily prerecorded and shared with patients online using minimal resources and costs,” Dr Tripathi said. Citing the main limitation of the study, researchers said the participants self-reported their seizure frequency and they may not have remembered all the information accurately. However, they say the findings “elevate the need to consider alternative therapies and activities for people with epilepsy facing stigma”. Read More Jonnie Irwin says he ‘never thought’ he’d be alive to see his 50th birthday Billy Connolly shares health update on Parkinson’s disease: ‘Every day gets stranger’ What are the symptoms of Parkinson's disease and how can it be treated? Jonnie Irwin says he ‘never thought’ he’d be alive to see his 50th birthday Billy Connolly shares health update on Parkinson’s disease: ‘Every day gets stranger’ What are the symptoms of Parkinson's disease and how can it be treated?

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