Twenty-two states have laws or constitutional provisions in place that show an inclination to ban abortion as quickly as possible if the Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade. In recent years, four more have passed laws that lay the groundwork for such bans.
The distance hurdle
How distance to the nearest abortion clinic changes for millions of women without Roe v. Wade
Millions of women farther from abortion clinics
With Roe in place, around 18,000 women currently live in counties that are more than 300 miles away from the nearest abortion clinic. If Roe v. Wade is overturned, that number jumps to 14.5 million based on the number of states with so-called “trigger laws” that ban abortion, and to nearly 30 million if several more states enact laws restricting abortion.
Three maps show different scenarios demonstrating distance for each U.S. county to the nearest abortion clinic.
The women affected by Roe v. Wade’s reversal
Census data show that women in counties with higher poverty rates and less health insurance coverage are more likely to be farther away from the nearest abortion clinic if Roe v. Wade is overturned.
Two bar charts show that poverty and lack of healthcare both increase the farther one is from an abortion clinic in the Guttmacher Institute’s likely scenario.
Edited by
Julia Wolfe, Feilding Cage, and Aurora Ellis
