This report documents some of the impacts of increasing wildfires in Oregon on sexual and reproductive health and rights, and how these impacts intersect with disadvantages or historical injustices and disparities. An international human rights organization, Human Rights Watch, and an Oregon-based US perinatal rights organization, Nurturely, produced this report based on more than 50 interviews with community-based birth workers like doulas and lactation consultants, midwives, doctors, social workers, community health workers, NGO workers, activists, and public health officials in Oregon, and with epidemiologists and climate experts from across the country both in the federal government and in academia. The report focuses on Oregon because it is among the states most impacted by wildfires and because Nurturely is based in the state. Our interviewees shared insights into how wildfires create and worsen reproductive harms for pregnant women and other pregnant people. They also described how pre-existing disadvantages make some pregnant people less able to take steps to protect themselves.
