State Bans Have Forced Over 60 Clinics To Stop Performing Abortions—Affecting 22 Million Women, Analysis Finds

Topline

State abortion bans enacted after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade have so far forced at least 66 clinics across 15 states to stop performing the procedure, according to new data from the pro-abortion rights Guttmacher Institute, impacting millions of women across the U.S. and leaving nearly every state where abortion is largely banned without any places offering the procedure.

Chief Nurse Executive Danielle Maness stands in an empty examination room that was used to perform … [+] abortions at the Women’s Health Center of West Virginia in Charleston, West Virginia, on June 29.

Key Facts

As of October 2—100 days after the Supreme Court overturned Roe—40 clinics had stopped performing abortions but still offered other services, and 26 had closed entirely, according to the Guttmacher Institute’s analysis, up from a total of 43 clinics that had stopped providing abortions as of July 24.

The analysis found 22 million women of reproductive age (ages 15-49) live in the 15 states affected by the closures, based on 2020 census data, making up 29% of all women in the U.S. in that age group.

Of the 15 states that have faced closures, only Georgia—which bans abortion at six weeks into a pregnancy—still has any providers left that perform abortions, which could be necessary since most states that have banned abortion still offer narrow exceptions and courts could block some of the bans.

Louisiana and Mississippi now have no open clinics at all, including any that provide other reproductive healthcare services besides abortion, while other states have at least one clinic still operating for non-abortion reproductive care.

The state with the most clinic closures is Texas, where 12 clinics closed entirely since the Supreme Court’s ruling and 11 remain open for other services.

The 14 states that have no clinics providing abortions are Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Idaho, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, West Virginia and Wisconsin.

Tangent

The analysis did not include states where abortion bans have been temporarily blocked in state courts, some of which have also experienced clinic closures. In North Dakota, for instance, the state’s abortion ban was blocked after its only remaining clinic had already closed and moved to Minnesota.

Big Number

125,780. That’s how many abortions were performed in 2020 in the 14 states that no longer have any abortion services, according to data compiled by the Guttmacher Institute. Georgia, where abortion is banned after six weeks but 13 clinics are still performing the procedure before that point, recorded 41,620 abortions in 2020.

Surprising Fact

Wisconsin is one of the 14 states without any abortion providers, even though the legality of its pre-Roe abortion ban, which was enacted in 1849, is still in question. The state’s Democratic Attorney General Josh Kaul has said the state won’t enforce the law and sued to block it in court, but abortion clinics there have stopped performing the procedure anyway, given the uncertainty. Gov. Tony Evers (D) called a special session for the legislature to approve a referendum on the state’s abortion ban to put to voters, but the Republican-controlled Senate convened Tuesday for just 15 seconds before adjourning without considering the issue.

What To Watch For

Additional clinics could close or stop performing abortions as more states outlaw the procedure. Near-total abortion bans that are now blocked in court in six states—Indiana, North Dakota, Ohio, South Carolina, Utah and Wyoming—could still be reinstated, and additional states could move to ban the procedure through new legislation. Elisabeth Smith, director of state policy at the Center for Reproductive Rights, predicted to Forbes last week that more state legislatures that haven’t met since the Supreme Court’s decisions will pass new abortion bans when they reconvene in 2023, including in states whose existing bans have been blocked in court. “The ‘status quo’ of 13 states with total criminal bands, is going to rise,” Smith said. The Guttmacher Institute predicts 26 states are ultimately certain or likely to ban abortion, though it still remains to be seen how many of those bans will be upheld in state court.

Key Background

The Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade on June 24 in a case concerning Mississippi’s 15-week abortion ban, immediately setting off a wave of state bans across the country as the court struck down the federal right to an abortion and let states outlaw the procedure. The bans criminalize performing virtually all abortions and make it a felony to do so, leaving many physicians unwilling or hesitant to perform the procedure even in medical emergencies that may be permissible under state laws (no state ban has so far imposed criminal penalties on the person getting the abortion). The proliferation of state bans and resulting clinic closures has sent pregnant people in states where abortion is banned across state lines, filling up abortion clinics in places where abortion remains legal. Clinics in Illinois reported in August they had three-week wait times and 86% of patients were coming from out of state, and many Democratic-led states have implemented policies designed to protect abortion rights and shield providers from legal consequences if they perform abortions for patients coming from out-of-state.