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Pregnancy is unusually complicated in humanitarian crises. Midwives also often have to help women who have experienced sexual violence and have reproductive health issues.

Plan B One-Step, which costs around $50, will be available on pharmacy and other retail shelves without age restriction. But the much cheaper, two-pill versions will remain behind the pharmacy counter, with prescriptions required for those under age 17.

The most comprehensive survey on female genital mutilation and cutting finds the practice has decreased in more than half of the countries where it persists. But in parts of eastern Africa, about 90 percent of girls still undergo the abusive procedure.

Texas is one of several states that have passed laws tightening standards for clinics and doctors who provide abortions. Proponents say the laws make the procedure safer. But abortion rights advocates say the tightened requirements are unnecessary and driven by ideology, not safety concerns.

States are setting an abortion limit at 20 weeks after fertilization, but that may clash with established standards for calculating the viability of a pregnancy. It could also open the new laws up to constitutional challenges.

Texas last week became the 12th state to ban most abortions after 20 weeks. But most of the state laws don't define 20 weeks the same way doctors do.

As soon as Texas Gov. Rick Perry signs the sweeping, omnibus abortion bill into law, lawyers with the abortion-rights movement are poised to challenge it in federal courts. Their problem will be the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, one of the most conservative in the country.

During the first half of 2013, more than a dozen states enacted 45 separate provisions restricting access to abortion. High-profile battles continue in Texas and North Carolina. The restrictions range from bans to stricter regulations of clinics.

Three years ago, the Catholic Health Association, whose members run hospitals and nursing homes across the country, backed passage of the federal health law. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, which represents the hierarchy of the church, opposed it. The groups remain divided over the law's requirement for most employer-based health insurance plans to provide women with contraceptives.

At least 148 female inmates at two state facilities underwent tubal ligation surgery between 2006 and 2010, according to the Center for Investigative Reporting.