In 1950, the marriage reform was introduced, which abolished arranged marriages and wives could initiate divorce as well as buy and sell properties. This granted much more independence for women and they began to have more rights. The most notable was the easy access to abortion which wiped out prostitution, and the focus on women’s reproductive health resulted in improved training of the midwives. However, soon enough in 1957 women lost the independence that land reform had given them, but this time they were less vulnerable as they could fall back on community support. Albeit having a significant change in the status and role of women during the first years of Mao’s rule, his policies were only noticeable in the larger, urban areas; the rural society which composed the majority of Chinese society saw little change as women were still treated as a man’s