On May 25, 2020, George Floyd, an unarmed Black man, was murdered by police. George Floyd’s murder sparked racial justice protests across the United States and the world throughout the summer of 2020. Police used weapons against protestors, including chemical agents called “tear gas” which have been banned in war. These chemical agents were used even though we don’t know very much about how they impact reproductive health.
Some protesters talked about seeing changed in their reproductive health after being exposed to tear gas. These changes included starting their period when they didn’t expect to. After hearing people’s stories, we wanted to create a study to look at how tear gas impacts the reproductive health of people with uteri.