Public websites maintained by activists detail another strategy that pushes the legal envelope: using mail-forwarding accounts with commercial shipping services. Such paid services often are used by people in the military or frequent travelers who want their mail sent to wherever they are at a given time.
So an abortion patient in Texas, for instance, where abortion is banned, could set up a mail-forwarding account in Colorado, where it’s legal. The patient could then use the Colorado address to accept the shipment of abortion pills after the consultation with a telehealth provider. The mail-forwarding service would then forward the pills to the patient in Texas.
Some providers avoid asking direct questions about the location of their patients during the consultation, according to activists, creating a layer of plausible deniability. All the patient needs is a shipping address in a state where abortion is legal. Addresses used with a mail-forwarding service look like standard residential addresses, so there’s nothing to indicate to the provider that the patient is using such a service.
“It’s don’t ask, don’t tell,” said Wells, whose Plan C website serves as a clearinghouse of information about abortion pills from FDA-authorized, domestic sources as well as unauthorized foreign channels. Plan C received more than half a million webpage visits in the first few days after the Supreme Court ruling, Wells said.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member