Justices on the US Supreme Court are considering two challenges to abortion restrictions that could have wide-reaching implications for access to abortion across the country. In this episode, we look at what's at stake, and how else abortion laws are changing around the world.

Featuring Amanda Jean Stevenson, assistant professor of sociology, University of Colorado Boulder; Sydney Calkin, lecturer in political geography, Queen Mary University of London and Jane Marcus Delgado, professor of political science, College of Staten Island, CUNY. 

We talk to a forensic scientist, Patrick Randolph-Quinney, Associate Professor of Forensic Science, Northumbria University, Newcastle in England. He explains how he studied bones to help solve the mystery of how to tell if a person was killed by a lightning strike.

And Wale Fatade, commissioning editor at The Conversation in Lagos, gives us some recommended reading. 

The Conversation Weekly is produced by Mend Mariwany and Gemma Ware, with sound design by Eloise Stevens. Our theme music is by Neeta Sarl. You can sign up to The Conversation’s free daily email here. Full credits for this episode available here.

Further reading

• The erosion of Roe v. Wade and abortion access didn’t begin in Texas or Mississippi – it started in Pennsylvania in 1992, by Alison Gash, University of Oregon
• Poland’s abortion ruling amounts to a ban – but it will not end access, by Sydney Calkin, Queen Mary University of London
• Study shows an abortion ban may lead to a 21% increase in pregnancy-related deaths, by Amanda Jean Stevenson, University of Colorado Boulder
• Forensic science is unlocking the mysteries of fatal lightning strikes, by Patrick Randolph-Quinney, Northumbria University, Newcastle; Nicholas Bacci and Tanya Nadine Augustine, University of the Witwatersrand
• African marine rules favour big industry, leaving small-scale fishers in the lurch by Ifesinachi Okafor-Yarwood, University of St Andrews; Edward H. Allison, CGIAR System Organisation 
• My formula for a tasty and nutritious Nigerian soup - with termites by Adedayo Adeboye, Osun State University