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Wednesday 23 OctOber 2024

Women in states with bans are getting abortions at similar rates as

under Roe, report says

ers of the telehealth pills is
Continued from Front the Massachusetts Abortion
Access Project.
"The abortion bans are Cofounder Angel Foster
not eliminating the need said the group prescribed
for abortion," said Ushma to about 500 patients a
Upadhyay, a University of month, mostly in states with
California, San Francisco bans, from its September
public health social scientist 2023 launch through last
and a co-chair of the #We- month.The group charged
Count survey. "People are $250 per person while al-
jumping over these hurdles lowing people to pay less
because they have to." if they couldn't afford that.
Abortion patterns have Starting this month, with the
shifted help of grant funding that
The #WeCount report be- pays operating costs, it's
gan surveying abortion trying a different approach:
providers across the coun- Setting the price at $5 but
try monthly just before Roe letting patients know they'd
was overturned, creating appreciate more for those
a snapshot of abortion who can pay it. Foster said
trends. In some states, a the group is on track to pro-
portion of the data is esti- vide 1,500 to 2,000 abor-
mated. The effort makes tions monthly with the new
data public with less than a model.
six-month lag, giving a pic- Foster called the Supreme
ture of trends far faster than Court's 2020 decision "a hu-
the U.S. Centers for Disease man rights and social jus-
Control and Prevention, tice catastrophe" while also
whose most recent annual A patient prepares to take the first of two combination pills, mifepristone, for a medication abortion saying that "there's an irony
report covers abortion in during a visit to a clinic in Kansas City, Kan., on, Oct. 12, 2022. in what's happened in the
2021. Associated Press post-Dobbs landscape."
The report has chronicled "In some places abortion
quick shifts since the Su- and 88,000 in 2023.One rea- 1,500 in Mississippi and often came from abroad. care is more accessible
preme Court's Dobbs v. son is telehealth, which got nearly 800 in Missouri, for in- They also do not tally peo- and affordable than it was,"
Jackson Women's Health a boost when some Demo- stance. ple who received pills but she said.
Organization ruling that cratic-controlled states last Travel is still the main means did not use them. There have no major legal
ended the national right year began implementing of access for women in West Virginia women, for challenges of shield laws so
to abortion and opened laws to protect prescribers. states with bans example, obtained nearly far, but abortion opponents
the door to enforcement of In April 2022, about 1 in 25 Data from another group, 220 abortions monthly in have tried to get one of the
state bans. abortions were from pills the Guttmacher Institute, the second half of 2023, main pills removed from the
The number of abortions prescribed via telehealth, shows that women in states mostly by traveling — more market. Earlier this year, the
in states with bans at all the report found. In June with bans still rely mostly on than in 2020, when they re- U.S. Supreme Court unani-
stages of pregnancy fell 2024, it was 1 in 5. travel to get abortions. ceived about 140 a month. mously preserved access
to near zero. It also plum- The newest report is the first By combining results of the For Louisiana residents, the to the drug, mifepristone,
meted in states where bans time #WeCount has broken two surveys and compar- monthly abortion numbers while finding that a group
kick in around six weeks of down state-by-state num- ing them with Guttmacher's were about the same, with of anti-abortion doctors
pregnancy, which is before bers for abortion pill pre- counts of in-person abor- just under 700 from July and organizations did not
many women know they're scriptions. tions from 2020, #WeCount through December 2023, have the legal right to chal-
pregnant. About half the telehealth found women in states with mostly through shield laws, lenge the 2000 federal ap-
But the nationwide total abortion pill prescriptions bans throughout pregnan- and 635 in 2020. However, proval of the drug.
has been about the same now go to patients in states cy were getting abortions Oklahoma residents ob- This month, three states
or above the level from be- with abortion bans or restric- in similar numbers as they tained fewer abortions asked a judge for permis-
fore the ruling. The study es- tions on telehealth abortion were in 2020. in 2023, with the monthly sion to file a lawsuit aimed
timates 99,000 abortions oc- prescriptions. The numbers do not ac- number falling to under 470 at rolling back federal de-
curred each month in the In the second half of last count for pills obtained from from about 690 in 2020. cisions that allowed easier
first half of 2024, up from the year, the pills were sent to outside the medical system Telehealth providers access to the pill — includ-
81,000 monthly from April about 2,800 women each in the earlier period, when emerged quickly ing through telehealth.q
through December 2022 month in Texas, more than those prescriptions most One of the major provid-