Health
Pritzker Signs Bill Requiring Public Colleges in Illinois to Offer Contraception, Medication Abortion
Gov. JB Pritzker signs bills aimed at further protecting reproductive rights in Illinois on Aug. 22, 2025, at the University YMCA in Champaign, Illinois. (Courtesy of state of Illinois live stream)
Two bills aimed at further protecting reproductive rights in Illinois were signed by Gov. JB Pritzker on Friday, expanding protections to health care providers and making contraception and medication abortion more accessible to college students.
HB3709 requires public colleges and universities to offer contraception and medication abortion if the schools have an on-campus pharmacy or student health center, beginning in the 2025-2026 school year. University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign student advocates and recent graduates Emma Darbro and Grace Hosey testified before state legislative committees in support of the bill. The legislation was partly inspired by a student referendum question at UIUC last year regarding increasing access to contraception and medication abortion on campus.
“Our student advocacy with Planned Parenthood started back in 2022, after the overturning of Roe vs. Wade, with a very simple objective: to protect students’ reproductive rights by expanding student access to birth control and abortion services,” Darbro said during Pritzker’s bill signing event in Champaign.
Illinois joins a small handful of states ensuring students can access abortion care on college campuses, with California, Massachusetts and New York having similar laws in place, according to the Chicago Abortion Fund.
“By becoming the first state in the Midwest to guarantee public university campus access to medication abortion and contraception, Illinois is sending a clear message: our young people’s health and futures matter,” Chicago Abortion Fund advocacy and communications director Alicia Hurtado said in a statement.
Pritzker also signed an expanded state shield law, HB3637, which protects more providers, like licensed midwives and wholesale drug distributors, from discipline for providing lawful health care services in Illinois. The bill also ensures health care providers can still prescribe medication previously approved by the FDA but whose approval is revoked and is still considered effective by the World Health Organization, according to the governor’s office.
“We will not allow extreme, restrictive policies from other states to threaten the livelihoods of our health care providers and dictate the care that people receive in our state,” state Sen. Karina Villa (D-West Chicago) said during the bill signing ceremony.
Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul was part of a coalition of attorneys general Wednesday who called on the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to remove restrictions on mifepristone, a drug used in medication abortions. The filing argued the safety of the medication and referenced U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. telling a Senate committee in May that he had ordered the FDA to conduct a “complete review” of mifepristone.
The bill signings come after Texas Democrats gathered with Planned Parenthood leaders in Chicago last week to highlight Illinois’ role in providing reproductive care for out-of-state patients, and to also warn how the dismantling of sexual and reproductive care in Texas threatens access in other states.
“The progress we’ve made together to advance women’s rights in the state of Illinois, in protecting reproductive justice, in advancing equal rights, in promoting women’s empowerment, has been nothing short of remarkable,” Pritzker said Friday. “All of it has been absolutely necessary because the extremists in Washington, D.C., and in Florida, and in Idaho, and in Texas, and elsewhere all across the country are escalating their attacks on women.”
Contact Eunice Alpasan: [email protected]
