Jane was the name of the network of feminists in Chicago that helped women get abortions before legalization.
At first, they referred women to illegal abortionists, but eventually, they began to perform abortions themselves, even though they had no medical training.
The book written about Jane described what happened when visiting feminists from California watched the members of Jane performing abortions.
“The women in Jane invited their visitors, with whom they seemed to have so much in common, to observe a workday. According to the service members who were there, the impression Jane made was not all that favorable.
“They were appalled by our sloppiness,” Julia recalls, “our casualness with the Kleenex and plastic sheets and no gloves.”
They were shocked that the service did not use an autoclave, a steam pressure machine, the proper way to sterilize instruments.
Because the service moved from apartment to apartment, they couldn’t carry around a cumbersome autoclave. Instead they relied on boiling and cold sterilizer, which was used in wartime by front line medical units.”
Laura Kaplan The Story of Jane: The Legendary Underground Feminist Abortion Service (New York: Pantheon Books, 1995) 198
Apparently, the members of Jane were not providing very high quality abortion care.
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