Rules about abortion are sometimes wildly controversial. However what results to they really have? Caitlin Myers addresses these points in “From Roe to Dobbs: 50 Years of Trigger and Impact of US State Abortion Rules” (Annual Overview of Public Well being 2025, pp. 433-446).
As a place to begin, contemplate the years earlier than and after the 1973 US Supreme Court docket choice in Roe v. Wade that struck down present abortion restrictions throughout the nation. The left-hand panel reveals the states which has repealed the bans on abortion earlier than Roe in purple, those who had relaxed however not eradicated their ban earlier than Roe in pink, and people wherein abortion was legalized by Roe in grey. Within the purple states that had already repealed their ban on abortion, the variety of abortions had risen within the years earlier than Roe, however had then began declining–and the decline continued after the passage of Roe. A part of the rationale for the decline within the early-legalization states is that, after Roe, girls now not needed to journey from different states the place abortion was unlawful. Within the different teams of states, the variety of abortions rose.
As Myers argues, the consequences on abortion ranges of states that repealed their abortion bans earlier than 1973 could be very massive–in all probability bigger than the rise in abortion following the Roe choice. She writes:
Of the three broad coverage modifications liberalizing abortion entry—early reforms, early repeal, and repeal with Roe—it’s early repeal that ends in the best results on nationwide abortion and start charges. As Joyce et al. (51) conclude following an in depth evaluation of the consequences of distance to early repeal states, “The story that emerges from these knowledge is that…Roe v. Wade was arguably much less necessary for unintended childbearing than was entry to companies in California, the District of Columbia and particularly New York within the years earlier than Roe” (pp. 813–14) as a result of so many individuals had been capable of journey to those early repeal states even when their state of residence had not but legalized abortion.
States then examined the boundaries of what the Supreme Court docket would permit with quite a lot of restrictions: necessary ready intervals earlier than an abortion, necessary counseling earlier than an abortion, various kinds of content material that could be concerned in that counseling, parental permission for teenager and/or spousal permission for wives, whether or not Medicaid funding could possibly be used to pay for abortions, whether or not abortions wanted to be carried out in or close to hospitals, what docs had been allowed to carry out abortions, and others. This array of guidelines–as they had been proposed, handed or failed in legislatures, and had been upheld or not by courts–offers a wealthy set of contexts for researchers.
Right here’s one instance. In North Carolina within the Eighties and into the Nineties, there was a state fund to pay for abortions for low-income girls: on this manner, the state didn’t draw on federal Medicaid funds to pay for abortions. However the state fund typically ran out of cash. Myers writes: “Cook dinner et al. (25) exploit a pure experiment that happened inside North Carolina between 1980 and 1994 when the state abortion fund ran out of cash on 5 totally different events. Evaluating modifications in outcomes amongst girls in search of abortions and eligible for funding, the authors conclude that when funding is unavailable, about one-third of pregnancies that will have been terminated are as a substitute carried to time period …”
This type of research is known as a “pure experiment”–that’s, there was no plan for the North Carolina fund to expire of cash. It appears unlikely that sexual exercise in North Carolina was being adjusted based on the state of the fund. As an alternative, some North Carolina girls in search of abortions discovered that funding was accessible, and others didn’t, and this had an impact on their deicsions.
Myers goes into element in contemplating the array of pure experiments which were analyzed. For instance, when a state altered its abortion legal guidelines, then girls who lived comparatively near that state had been additionally affected, as a result of it was comparatively straightforward for them to journey to that state, whereas girls residing farther from that state had been much less affected, as a result of their prices of travelling to that state had been larger. As one other instance, these fascinated with, for instance, the appliance of difference-in-differences statistical strategies might wish to try the paper.
Right here, I’ll point out a number of the backside strains of this survey of the proof (citations omitted right here, however seem within the article iteself): When and the place abortion is extra restricted, start charges are larger. Greater start charges, particularly for ladies at youthful ages, are related to decrease ranges of academic achievement, and thus with lasting results on employment outcomes. These impact are sometimes bigger for black girls then for white girls.
What concerning the interval for the reason that 2022 US Supreme Court docket choice in Dobbs v. Jackson, which struck down Roe v. Wade and thus gave states a lot wider latitude in setting abortion legal guidelines? After all, the proof on this level continues to be evolving, and the setting for abortion is now quite totally different than it was earlier than 1973. Myers notes:
- “Abortion previous to 12 weeks’ gestation stays authorized in 34 states (65) and plenty of states have bolstered their protections (22), offering many extra locations than existed in 1971, when abortion was authorized in solely 6 jurisdictions.”
- “The supply of abortion companies has additionally developed, with a significant shift occurring in 2000 when the US Meals and Drug Administration (FDA) authorized the drug mifepristone for the termination of pregnancies. The proportion of treatment abortions grew quickly, from 6% of all abortions in 2001 to 39% in 2017.”
- “[I]n December 2021 the FDA lifted the restriction completely (55), permitting well being care suppliers to dispense abortion medicines on to sufferers through mail with out requiring the affected person to obtain in-person session or assessments (85). This expanded abortion entry within the 32 states that didn’t limit telehealth abortion (5), probably fueling the rise in treatment abortions to 63% of all abortions by 2023 … By the tip of 2023, telehealth accounted for almost 1 in 5 abortions in the US (83), and nationwide abortions had truly risen relative to pre-Dobbs ranges …”
- “But not everybody in search of an abortion can discover a approach to drive a whole lot of miles to succeed in services in nonban states or will discover telehealth treatment abortion a suitable choice. Close to-total abortion bans enforced within the first 6 months after Dobbs are estimated to have elevated births in ban states by a median of two.3% relative to if no ban had been enforced (26). The estimated results of bans on fertility are better in states the place distances are best, reaching 4.4% in Mississippi and 5.0% in Texas …”
As well as, teenage start charges have fallen dramatically during the last three many years for an array of causes indirectly associated to availability of abortion: much less sexual exercise, better use of contraception, and extra broadly, a bigger share of younger girls viewing their early maturity as a time for schooling and job expertise, with later ages for marriage and childbearing.
Rules about abortion are sometimes wildly controversial. However what results to they really have? Caitlin Myers addresses these points in “From Roe to Dobbs: 50 Years of Trigger and Impact of US State Abortion Rules” (Annual Overview of Public Well being 2025, pp. 433-446).
As a place to begin, contemplate the years earlier than and after the 1973 US Supreme Court docket choice in Roe v. Wade that struck down present abortion restrictions throughout the nation. The left-hand panel reveals the states which has repealed the bans on abortion earlier than Roe in purple, those who had relaxed however not eradicated their ban earlier than Roe in pink, and people wherein abortion was legalized by Roe in grey. Within the purple states that had already repealed their ban on abortion, the variety of abortions had risen within the years earlier than Roe, however had then began declining–and the decline continued after the passage of Roe. A part of the rationale for the decline within the early-legalization states is that, after Roe, girls now not needed to journey from different states the place abortion was unlawful. Within the different teams of states, the variety of abortions rose.
As Myers argues, the consequences on abortion ranges of states that repealed their abortion bans earlier than 1973 could be very massive–in all probability bigger than the rise in abortion following the Roe choice. She writes:
Of the three broad coverage modifications liberalizing abortion entry—early reforms, early repeal, and repeal with Roe—it’s early repeal that ends in the best results on nationwide abortion and start charges. As Joyce et al. (51) conclude following an in depth evaluation of the consequences of distance to early repeal states, “The story that emerges from these knowledge is that…Roe v. Wade was arguably much less necessary for unintended childbearing than was entry to companies in California, the District of Columbia and particularly New York within the years earlier than Roe” (pp. 813–14) as a result of so many individuals had been capable of journey to those early repeal states even when their state of residence had not but legalized abortion.
States then examined the boundaries of what the Supreme Court docket would permit with quite a lot of restrictions: necessary ready intervals earlier than an abortion, necessary counseling earlier than an abortion, various kinds of content material that could be concerned in that counseling, parental permission for teenager and/or spousal permission for wives, whether or not Medicaid funding could possibly be used to pay for abortions, whether or not abortions wanted to be carried out in or close to hospitals, what docs had been allowed to carry out abortions, and others. This array of guidelines–as they had been proposed, handed or failed in legislatures, and had been upheld or not by courts–offers a wealthy set of contexts for researchers.
Right here’s one instance. In North Carolina within the Eighties and into the Nineties, there was a state fund to pay for abortions for low-income girls: on this manner, the state didn’t draw on federal Medicaid funds to pay for abortions. However the state fund typically ran out of cash. Myers writes: “Cook dinner et al. (25) exploit a pure experiment that happened inside North Carolina between 1980 and 1994 when the state abortion fund ran out of cash on 5 totally different events. Evaluating modifications in outcomes amongst girls in search of abortions and eligible for funding, the authors conclude that when funding is unavailable, about one-third of pregnancies that will have been terminated are as a substitute carried to time period …”
This type of research is known as a “pure experiment”–that’s, there was no plan for the North Carolina fund to expire of cash. It appears unlikely that sexual exercise in North Carolina was being adjusted based on the state of the fund. As an alternative, some North Carolina girls in search of abortions discovered that funding was accessible, and others didn’t, and this had an impact on their deicsions.
Myers goes into element in contemplating the array of pure experiments which were analyzed. For instance, when a state altered its abortion legal guidelines, then girls who lived comparatively near that state had been additionally affected, as a result of it was comparatively straightforward for them to journey to that state, whereas girls residing farther from that state had been much less affected, as a result of their prices of travelling to that state had been larger. As one other instance, these fascinated with, for instance, the appliance of difference-in-differences statistical strategies might wish to try the paper.
Right here, I’ll point out a number of the backside strains of this survey of the proof (citations omitted right here, however seem within the article iteself): When and the place abortion is extra restricted, start charges are larger. Greater start charges, particularly for ladies at youthful ages, are related to decrease ranges of academic achievement, and thus with lasting results on employment outcomes. These impact are sometimes bigger for black girls then for white girls.
What concerning the interval for the reason that 2022 US Supreme Court docket choice in Dobbs v. Jackson, which struck down Roe v. Wade and thus gave states a lot wider latitude in setting abortion legal guidelines? After all, the proof on this level continues to be evolving, and the setting for abortion is now quite totally different than it was earlier than 1973. Myers notes:
- “Abortion previous to 12 weeks’ gestation stays authorized in 34 states (65) and plenty of states have bolstered their protections (22), offering many extra locations than existed in 1971, when abortion was authorized in solely 6 jurisdictions.”
- “The supply of abortion companies has additionally developed, with a significant shift occurring in 2000 when the US Meals and Drug Administration (FDA) authorized the drug mifepristone for the termination of pregnancies. The proportion of treatment abortions grew quickly, from 6% of all abortions in 2001 to 39% in 2017.”
- “[I]n December 2021 the FDA lifted the restriction completely (55), permitting well being care suppliers to dispense abortion medicines on to sufferers through mail with out requiring the affected person to obtain in-person session or assessments (85). This expanded abortion entry within the 32 states that didn’t limit telehealth abortion (5), probably fueling the rise in treatment abortions to 63% of all abortions by 2023 … By the tip of 2023, telehealth accounted for almost 1 in 5 abortions in the US (83), and nationwide abortions had truly risen relative to pre-Dobbs ranges …”
- “But not everybody in search of an abortion can discover a approach to drive a whole lot of miles to succeed in services in nonban states or will discover telehealth treatment abortion a suitable choice. Close to-total abortion bans enforced within the first 6 months after Dobbs are estimated to have elevated births in ban states by a median of two.3% relative to if no ban had been enforced (26). The estimated results of bans on fertility are better in states the place distances are best, reaching 4.4% in Mississippi and 5.0% in Texas …”
As well as, teenage start charges have fallen dramatically during the last three many years for an array of causes indirectly associated to availability of abortion: much less sexual exercise, better use of contraception, and extra broadly, a bigger share of younger girls viewing their early maturity as a time for schooling and job expertise, with later ages for marriage and childbearing.
Rules about abortion are sometimes wildly controversial. However what results to they really have? Caitlin Myers addresses these points in “From Roe to Dobbs: 50 Years of Trigger and Impact of US State Abortion Rules” (Annual Overview of Public Well being 2025, pp. 433-446).
As a place to begin, contemplate the years earlier than and after the 1973 US Supreme Court docket choice in Roe v. Wade that struck down present abortion restrictions throughout the nation. The left-hand panel reveals the states which has repealed the bans on abortion earlier than Roe in purple, those who had relaxed however not eradicated their ban earlier than Roe in pink, and people wherein abortion was legalized by Roe in grey. Within the purple states that had already repealed their ban on abortion, the variety of abortions had risen within the years earlier than Roe, however had then began declining–and the decline continued after the passage of Roe. A part of the rationale for the decline within the early-legalization states is that, after Roe, girls now not needed to journey from different states the place abortion was unlawful. Within the different teams of states, the variety of abortions rose.
As Myers argues, the consequences on abortion ranges of states that repealed their abortion bans earlier than 1973 could be very massive–in all probability bigger than the rise in abortion following the Roe choice. She writes:
Of the three broad coverage modifications liberalizing abortion entry—early reforms, early repeal, and repeal with Roe—it’s early repeal that ends in the best results on nationwide abortion and start charges. As Joyce et al. (51) conclude following an in depth evaluation of the consequences of distance to early repeal states, “The story that emerges from these knowledge is that…Roe v. Wade was arguably much less necessary for unintended childbearing than was entry to companies in California, the District of Columbia and particularly New York within the years earlier than Roe” (pp. 813–14) as a result of so many individuals had been capable of journey to those early repeal states even when their state of residence had not but legalized abortion.
States then examined the boundaries of what the Supreme Court docket would permit with quite a lot of restrictions: necessary ready intervals earlier than an abortion, necessary counseling earlier than an abortion, various kinds of content material that could be concerned in that counseling, parental permission for teenager and/or spousal permission for wives, whether or not Medicaid funding could possibly be used to pay for abortions, whether or not abortions wanted to be carried out in or close to hospitals, what docs had been allowed to carry out abortions, and others. This array of guidelines–as they had been proposed, handed or failed in legislatures, and had been upheld or not by courts–offers a wealthy set of contexts for researchers.
Right here’s one instance. In North Carolina within the Eighties and into the Nineties, there was a state fund to pay for abortions for low-income girls: on this manner, the state didn’t draw on federal Medicaid funds to pay for abortions. However the state fund typically ran out of cash. Myers writes: “Cook dinner et al. (25) exploit a pure experiment that happened inside North Carolina between 1980 and 1994 when the state abortion fund ran out of cash on 5 totally different events. Evaluating modifications in outcomes amongst girls in search of abortions and eligible for funding, the authors conclude that when funding is unavailable, about one-third of pregnancies that will have been terminated are as a substitute carried to time period …”
This type of research is known as a “pure experiment”–that’s, there was no plan for the North Carolina fund to expire of cash. It appears unlikely that sexual exercise in North Carolina was being adjusted based on the state of the fund. As an alternative, some North Carolina girls in search of abortions discovered that funding was accessible, and others didn’t, and this had an impact on their deicsions.
Myers goes into element in contemplating the array of pure experiments which were analyzed. For instance, when a state altered its abortion legal guidelines, then girls who lived comparatively near that state had been additionally affected, as a result of it was comparatively straightforward for them to journey to that state, whereas girls residing farther from that state had been much less affected, as a result of their prices of travelling to that state had been larger. As one other instance, these fascinated with, for instance, the appliance of difference-in-differences statistical strategies might wish to try the paper.
Right here, I’ll point out a number of the backside strains of this survey of the proof (citations omitted right here, however seem within the article iteself): When and the place abortion is extra restricted, start charges are larger. Greater start charges, particularly for ladies at youthful ages, are related to decrease ranges of academic achievement, and thus with lasting results on employment outcomes. These impact are sometimes bigger for black girls then for white girls.
What concerning the interval for the reason that 2022 US Supreme Court docket choice in Dobbs v. Jackson, which struck down Roe v. Wade and thus gave states a lot wider latitude in setting abortion legal guidelines? After all, the proof on this level continues to be evolving, and the setting for abortion is now quite totally different than it was earlier than 1973. Myers notes:
- “Abortion previous to 12 weeks’ gestation stays authorized in 34 states (65) and plenty of states have bolstered their protections (22), offering many extra locations than existed in 1971, when abortion was authorized in solely 6 jurisdictions.”
- “The supply of abortion companies has additionally developed, with a significant shift occurring in 2000 when the US Meals and Drug Administration (FDA) authorized the drug mifepristone for the termination of pregnancies. The proportion of treatment abortions grew quickly, from 6% of all abortions in 2001 to 39% in 2017.”
- “[I]n December 2021 the FDA lifted the restriction completely (55), permitting well being care suppliers to dispense abortion medicines on to sufferers through mail with out requiring the affected person to obtain in-person session or assessments (85). This expanded abortion entry within the 32 states that didn’t limit telehealth abortion (5), probably fueling the rise in treatment abortions to 63% of all abortions by 2023 … By the tip of 2023, telehealth accounted for almost 1 in 5 abortions in the US (83), and nationwide abortions had truly risen relative to pre-Dobbs ranges …”
- “But not everybody in search of an abortion can discover a approach to drive a whole lot of miles to succeed in services in nonban states or will discover telehealth treatment abortion a suitable choice. Close to-total abortion bans enforced within the first 6 months after Dobbs are estimated to have elevated births in ban states by a median of two.3% relative to if no ban had been enforced (26). The estimated results of bans on fertility are better in states the place distances are best, reaching 4.4% in Mississippi and 5.0% in Texas …”
As well as, teenage start charges have fallen dramatically during the last three many years for an array of causes indirectly associated to availability of abortion: much less sexual exercise, better use of contraception, and extra broadly, a bigger share of younger girls viewing their early maturity as a time for schooling and job expertise, with later ages for marriage and childbearing.
Rules about abortion are sometimes wildly controversial. However what results to they really have? Caitlin Myers addresses these points in “From Roe to Dobbs: 50 Years of Trigger and Impact of US State Abortion Rules” (Annual Overview of Public Well being 2025, pp. 433-446).
As a place to begin, contemplate the years earlier than and after the 1973 US Supreme Court docket choice in Roe v. Wade that struck down present abortion restrictions throughout the nation. The left-hand panel reveals the states which has repealed the bans on abortion earlier than Roe in purple, those who had relaxed however not eradicated their ban earlier than Roe in pink, and people wherein abortion was legalized by Roe in grey. Within the purple states that had already repealed their ban on abortion, the variety of abortions had risen within the years earlier than Roe, however had then began declining–and the decline continued after the passage of Roe. A part of the rationale for the decline within the early-legalization states is that, after Roe, girls now not needed to journey from different states the place abortion was unlawful. Within the different teams of states, the variety of abortions rose.
As Myers argues, the consequences on abortion ranges of states that repealed their abortion bans earlier than 1973 could be very massive–in all probability bigger than the rise in abortion following the Roe choice. She writes:
Of the three broad coverage modifications liberalizing abortion entry—early reforms, early repeal, and repeal with Roe—it’s early repeal that ends in the best results on nationwide abortion and start charges. As Joyce et al. (51) conclude following an in depth evaluation of the consequences of distance to early repeal states, “The story that emerges from these knowledge is that…Roe v. Wade was arguably much less necessary for unintended childbearing than was entry to companies in California, the District of Columbia and particularly New York within the years earlier than Roe” (pp. 813–14) as a result of so many individuals had been capable of journey to those early repeal states even when their state of residence had not but legalized abortion.
States then examined the boundaries of what the Supreme Court docket would permit with quite a lot of restrictions: necessary ready intervals earlier than an abortion, necessary counseling earlier than an abortion, various kinds of content material that could be concerned in that counseling, parental permission for teenager and/or spousal permission for wives, whether or not Medicaid funding could possibly be used to pay for abortions, whether or not abortions wanted to be carried out in or close to hospitals, what docs had been allowed to carry out abortions, and others. This array of guidelines–as they had been proposed, handed or failed in legislatures, and had been upheld or not by courts–offers a wealthy set of contexts for researchers.
Right here’s one instance. In North Carolina within the Eighties and into the Nineties, there was a state fund to pay for abortions for low-income girls: on this manner, the state didn’t draw on federal Medicaid funds to pay for abortions. However the state fund typically ran out of cash. Myers writes: “Cook dinner et al. (25) exploit a pure experiment that happened inside North Carolina between 1980 and 1994 when the state abortion fund ran out of cash on 5 totally different events. Evaluating modifications in outcomes amongst girls in search of abortions and eligible for funding, the authors conclude that when funding is unavailable, about one-third of pregnancies that will have been terminated are as a substitute carried to time period …”
This type of research is known as a “pure experiment”–that’s, there was no plan for the North Carolina fund to expire of cash. It appears unlikely that sexual exercise in North Carolina was being adjusted based on the state of the fund. As an alternative, some North Carolina girls in search of abortions discovered that funding was accessible, and others didn’t, and this had an impact on their deicsions.
Myers goes into element in contemplating the array of pure experiments which were analyzed. For instance, when a state altered its abortion legal guidelines, then girls who lived comparatively near that state had been additionally affected, as a result of it was comparatively straightforward for them to journey to that state, whereas girls residing farther from that state had been much less affected, as a result of their prices of travelling to that state had been larger. As one other instance, these fascinated with, for instance, the appliance of difference-in-differences statistical strategies might wish to try the paper.
Right here, I’ll point out a number of the backside strains of this survey of the proof (citations omitted right here, however seem within the article iteself): When and the place abortion is extra restricted, start charges are larger. Greater start charges, particularly for ladies at youthful ages, are related to decrease ranges of academic achievement, and thus with lasting results on employment outcomes. These impact are sometimes bigger for black girls then for white girls.
What concerning the interval for the reason that 2022 US Supreme Court docket choice in Dobbs v. Jackson, which struck down Roe v. Wade and thus gave states a lot wider latitude in setting abortion legal guidelines? After all, the proof on this level continues to be evolving, and the setting for abortion is now quite totally different than it was earlier than 1973. Myers notes:
- “Abortion previous to 12 weeks’ gestation stays authorized in 34 states (65) and plenty of states have bolstered their protections (22), offering many extra locations than existed in 1971, when abortion was authorized in solely 6 jurisdictions.”
- “The supply of abortion companies has additionally developed, with a significant shift occurring in 2000 when the US Meals and Drug Administration (FDA) authorized the drug mifepristone for the termination of pregnancies. The proportion of treatment abortions grew quickly, from 6% of all abortions in 2001 to 39% in 2017.”
- “[I]n December 2021 the FDA lifted the restriction completely (55), permitting well being care suppliers to dispense abortion medicines on to sufferers through mail with out requiring the affected person to obtain in-person session or assessments (85). This expanded abortion entry within the 32 states that didn’t limit telehealth abortion (5), probably fueling the rise in treatment abortions to 63% of all abortions by 2023 … By the tip of 2023, telehealth accounted for almost 1 in 5 abortions in the US (83), and nationwide abortions had truly risen relative to pre-Dobbs ranges …”
- “But not everybody in search of an abortion can discover a approach to drive a whole lot of miles to succeed in services in nonban states or will discover telehealth treatment abortion a suitable choice. Close to-total abortion bans enforced within the first 6 months after Dobbs are estimated to have elevated births in ban states by a median of two.3% relative to if no ban had been enforced (26). The estimated results of bans on fertility are better in states the place distances are best, reaching 4.4% in Mississippi and 5.0% in Texas …”
As well as, teenage start charges have fallen dramatically during the last three many years for an array of causes indirectly associated to availability of abortion: much less sexual exercise, better use of contraception, and extra broadly, a bigger share of younger girls viewing their early maturity as a time for schooling and job expertise, with later ages for marriage and childbearing.
