There Were 10,000 Fewer Legal Abortions In The Two Months Following Dobbs
In the two months following the Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade, there were an estimated 10,670 fewer legal abortions, according to data collected by #WeCount, a research project funded by the nonprofit Society of Family Planning, which supports abortion rights.
Democrats made concerns about abortion access a key part of their campaign strategy this year, spending at least $103 million on abortion-focused ads between Labor Day and the end of October. But data on how many abortions are happening is typically collected only annually, and released months later. The #WeCount project is making data available sooner and including sources that have not been included in previous counts, like telehealth providers that don’t have brick-and-mortar clinics.
The data suggests more Americans traveled long distances to get abortions in the months following Dobbs. In states that saw declines in abortion numbers — which include the 15 states in which abortion was banned or severely limited after the Supreme Court decision — the number of abortions fell by about 22,000. Meanwhile, the number of abortions in other states rose, with clinics in places like Kansas reporting that half their patients were now from out of state. But those capacity increases were not large enough to absorb the shortfalls elsewhere. If current trends continue, there could be at least 60,000 fewer abortions in the year following Dobbs.
That said, this data includes only legal abortions. Abortion pills, available over the internet from activist groups and offshore pharmacies, are now a safe, reliable alternative, even in places where abortion is illegal. (Still, they can be painful and intense for some patients.) A recent analysis of data from Aid Access, an international activist group that provides pills through the mail in countries where abortion is illegal, reported increased requests in the U.S. in July and August, particularly in states with abortion bans. Those requests could be large enough to mean there has been no decline in abortions post-Dobbs — or maybe even an increase.
