2024
Year in
Review
This year, Ibis leveraged our deep, collaborative partnerships with reproductive justice advocates, service providers, and policymakers to take concrete steps toward advancing reproductive access across the globe.
From bringing evidence-based sexual and reproductive health resources to young people, to celebrating the first-ever birth control pill on shelves across the United States, we made key progress in improving access to sexual and reproductive health services through technology and bold approaches, centering communities, and removing barriers to care.
As 2024 comes to a close, we celebrate the momentous progress we have made, while preparing for an uncertain future with grave threats to sexual and reproductive health care access. Ibis’s pioneering research, dedication to scientific integrity, and commitment to building power have already advanced sexual and reproductive autonomy, choices, and health worldwide, and will continue to guide our work going forward. Our accomplishments to-date have equipped us to conduct research that is responsive to the needs of communities, uplifts their expertise, and increases access to care—no matter what the future holds.
Technology and bold approaches
LEFT Images from the Euki app, the privacy-first, comprehensive, and customizable period tracking app.
Improving SRH information and access for young people
Young people in South Africa face numerous barriers when accessing SRH services. To help meet their needs, we launched our mmoho Adolescent and Youth SRH Referral Helpline. The Helpline provides stigma-free, nonjudgmental, comprehensive, and inclusive information and referrals to SRH care throughout the country, including abortion and mental health services. Through a campaign to raise awareness—including an ad campaign on Y-FM, a pop culture radio station targeted to youth—we successfully expanded the reach of the Helpline, allowing more young people to access the services they seek.
Our mmoho Adolescent and Youth SRH Referral Helpline staff is trained to provide a non-judgmental and safe space that is upheld to the highest level of confidentiality.
Launching Euki as an independent nonprofit tech organization
In the ever-changing political and legal landscape, Euki—the privacy-first, comprehensive, and customizable period tracking app developed using research from Ibis—is uniquely positioned to be a key part of the movement-wide effort to protect and increase access to SRH information and care, including abortion. Ibis’s rigorous research approach and commitment to principled partnerships laid the foundation for an app that has now launched as its own dedicated, independent 501(c)3 nonprofit tech organization co-led by Ibis alum Ana Maria Ramirez, MPH. Euki addresses critical needs in this moment by providing comprehensive, inclusive, and evidence-based sexual health information to users without storing data or third-party tracking. Learn more about Euki here.
Harnessing the promise of misoprostol-only for medication abortion
As restrictions on abortion care continue to increase across the US, we have drawn on our pioneering work to understand the safety and effectiveness of misoprostol-only medication abortion. Over the past year, we served as thought leaders and research experts to identify ways that this regimen could improve abortion access at this critical moment—since it is less costly, carries fewer restrictions for use, and can be offered by a wider range of providers. Our new research findings highlighted the regimen's effectiveness and promise, and we are preparing to launch a randomized controlled trial to collect rigorous evidence that providers need to confidently prescribe and counsel patients on all of their medication abortion options. This work builds on results from our landmark SAFE Study, conducted with partners Argentina, Nigeria, and Southeast Asia, which affirmed the safety and effectiveness of self-managed abortion and misoprostol-only.
Centering communities
Building toward inclusive care for transgender and gender-expansive people
Narrow understandings of gender and sex have limited our understanding of SRH experiences for transgender, nonbinary, and gender-expansive (TGE) communities. Our innovative, community-informed approach has helped to make research more inclusive and aims to reduce glaring disparities in SRH outcomes for these individuals. We have filled these critical gaps by generating new evidence on pathways to parenthood and interest in over-the-counter progestin-only pills among TGE people, while also preparing for a large national survey of TGE people about SRH experiences. This work will include analyses by state policy context given devastating shifts in access to gender-affirming care.
Supporting young leaders to promote SRH
We work closely with young leaders in South Africa and throughout the Africa region, centering their leadership in the movement for better SRH access. Over the past year, we supported the AMAZE Africa Youth Ambassadors to facilitate peer-to-peer workshops, host webinar discussions, and engage with their communities about the importance of comprehensive sexuality education on radio and television. This is particularly critical given the continued barriers that our research has identified that prevent young people from accessing SRH information and care—including a recent study finding that 46% of those we surveyed felt uncomfortable visiting their community clinic.
ABOVE South Africa International Safe Abortion Day march.
Understanding telemedicine abortion access for Black and Latine communities
While the surge in telemedicine abortion provision in the United States is a largely positive development for abortion access, barriers remain—especially after Dobbs. In collaboration with University of California, San Francisco, we are working to understand whether Black and Latine individuals—groups who have been historically under-represented in telemedicine research—have equitable access to direct-to-patient models of telemedicine for abortion, including using Medicaid to cover the cost of telemedicine abortion care. Our results may be leveraged to improve Medicaid reimbursement policies in states which currently prohibit the use of Medicaid for these services.
Removing barriers to care
Expanding the reach of abortion accompaniment
In close collaboration with feminist abortion accompaniment partners in Latin America, Southeast Asia, and West Africa, we are evaluating new approaches to expand the reach of the abortion accompaniment model—particularly for communities that face barriers to care—to improve access and quality of care for abortion seekers. In Nigeria, Generation Initiative for Women and Youth Network (GIWYN) uses a Mobile Health Express Van to distribute reproductive health supplies and hold mobile trainings and educational outreach events. We partnered with GIWYN to understand the impact of their workshops, finding that attendees were less likely to report stigmatizing attitudes about abortion and had greater knowledge of safe abortion methods.
Photo Credit: GIWYN Nigeria
Bringing birth control pills over the counter
In March, we celebrated the launch of Opill, the first-ever over-the-counter (OTC) birth control pill in the United States, which is now the most effective form of birth control available without a prescription nationwide. This significant milestone came after nearly two decades of advocacy and research by members of the Free the Pill coalition, led by Ibis and comprised of nearly 250 partners. This year, the coalition has continued to prioritize work to ensure that OTC contraception is equitably accessible—calling for full insurance coverage at both the state and federal levels—and ensuring that low and no-cost options for accessing Opill are available to communities impacted most by barriers to contraceptive care. We are also laying the foundation for future OTC hormonal contraceptive options, including combined oral contraceptives, to continue expanding access to birth control pills across the country.
ABOVE Opill is now available over the counter
Understanding self-managed abortion experiences in India
In partnership with clinics, community-based organizations, and health workers, we sought to better understand the self-managed medication abortion journeys of people across six regions of India. We found that there were a variety of reasons why people chose to self-manage, but many respondents did not receive enough information about what to expect and most participants dealt with fear of stigma and judgement from health workers and support networks. To address these issues, we produced community- and provider-specific research briefs in English and Tamil, and also partnered with Agents of Ishq who created three comics—a guide to using abortion pills and two stories about self-managing abortions with support from family and friends—which aimed to combat stigma and dispel the idea that abortion seekers are alone or isolated in their journey.
ABOVE The Easy-Peasy AOI x Ibis Guide To Using Abortion Pills guide in English and Hindi.
Support us
We have urgent work to do, and we need your partnership to advance our vital, responsive projects. Our ambitious agenda seeks to understand and document the harms of increased restrictions; evaluate bold approaches to expand access to care; and support providers and overburdened systems facing public health crises. By making a donation to Ibis, you are helping to ensure that sexual and reproductive health care is accessible to everyone who wants and needs it.
As we look ahead, Ibis stands firm in our commitment to conducting rigorous research in principled partnership to advance sexual and reproductive autonomy, rights, and health. No matter what the future holds, we will conduct research that is responsive to the needs of communities—centering the voices of people most impacted by systems of oppression. Together, we can make progress toward a world where no one is left behind. Please contribute to our work to drive change in pursuit of a world where every person has the reproductive health information and care they need for themselves, their families, and their communities.