More than 100 people gathered Friday, Oct. 13, to consider women’s health and equity at the OC Women’s Health Summit hosted by UC Irvine’s public health program and the OC Women’s Health Project.

The event comes more than a year after the U.S. Supreme Court issued its ruling in the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization case, which upended Roe. v Wade and allowed for states to ban abortions, meaning millions of Americans no longer have guaranteed access to abortion care.

“Roe v. Wade and the Dobbs decision didn’t just impact abortions,” Sora Park Tanjasiri, a UCI public health professor, said. “We’re talking about an assault on evidence-based medicine. And we need to fight for physicians to be able to offer the best care they can to every patient. And we need to make sure to educate our policymakers.”

Friday was the ninth year for the OC Women’s Health Summit and involved a day of panels with experts in the field of sexual and reproductive health. Several speakers throughout the program spoke on the future of women’s reproductive care.

Bernadette Boden-Albala, director and dean of the UC Irvine Program in Public Health, said the event is designed to inspire action and motivate people to make the world a better place starting with women’s health.

“These conversations are important to have because we need everyone educated to what is really going on,” Boden-Albala said. “And to really understand the impact of all of our actions, from a vote, a conversation, putting something in the newspaper, to not doing anything.”