Legal Abortion Data Show a 6% Decline Since Roe Overturned


An abortion rights group has been carefully tracking legal abortion numbers since Roe was overturned. It has concluded, so far, numbers of legal abortions have dropped 6%. 

The group has also tracked as precisely as possible where the numbers have dropped the most. It is from poor areas in the states that have the most restrictions. In these areas, women often cannot afford days off of work, cannot get childcare, cannot afford the travel and so on. This tread was predicted long before Roe was gone. 

Anyone following abortion politics knows abortion numbers have been dropping since improved birth control has been available. This makes is possible, even likely, not all of the 6% was due to no Roe. One has to assume there are births that were due to the Roe overturn. The number of these births, however, will only be estimated when actual birth statistics are complied. If birth numbers do not rise, it raises questions about the effectiveness of state laws outlawing abortions. We have to remember birth numbers are affected by other variables. The average age of women, for example, affects fertility numbers.

The 6% number causes me to remember the nationwide election a few years ago in Ireland. Ireland, of course, has long been a country in which the Catholic Church has run its politics. For decades abortion was not legal there. The election overwhelmingly approved abortion in Ireland. 

According to polling, one of the big reasons abortion rights won in Ireland was that abortions were legal in England. Many thousands of women went to England year after year. As time went on, the knowledge became more widely accepted that most of the women not going to England and thus forced to give birth were poor. Even those who opposed abortions in Ireland became rational enough to realize that if abortion was available, it should be available to women of all incomes. We have not seen this rational and ethical reasoning develop widely here in the much larger U.S. My assumption is we will see it in time. It is too simply and logical to be missed by even the most disinterested voters. 

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