California abortion rate rises to highest level in a decade. What experts say
California’s abortion rate rose last year to its highest level in a decade as state legislation made it easier to get an abortion and thousands of people from states with abortion bans sought medical care here, new data show.
California health care professionals provided about 178,400 legal abortions in 2023, up by about 24,000, or 16%, from 2020, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a nonprofit organization that advocates for access to reproductive care.
“We don’t actually know what is behind the increase,” said Rachel Jones, the principal research scientist at Guttmacher. “We do know that California has been a model, in a lot of ways, in trying to increase access to abortion.”
The abortion rate in California fell sharply for decades in California, going from about 44 legal abortions per 1,000 women aged 15 to 44 in 1991 to about 16 per 1,000 women in 2017, Guttmacher data show.
The rate began to rise again in 2017 — an increase that continued after the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision overturning the constitutional right to an abortion previously enshrined in Roe v. Wade.
The 2022 decision led to full abortion bans in 13 states, mostly in the southeastern United States, and partial bans in several others. At the same time, California and many other states passed laws protecting abortion rights.
About 5,200 people traveled from other states to California to have a legal abortion in 2023, representing about 3% of abortions performed in the state.
Other states saw far more people traveling from out of state for an abortion. For example, about 12,500 people came to Kansas from other states for an abortion. About 14,500 came to New Mexico. About 36,800 came to Illinois.
“The states that saw the biggest increases were those that are adjacent to states where abortion was pretty much completely banned,” Jones said.
During the last several years, California legislators passed multiple laws to increase abortion access in the state. Those laws have helped more women obtain abortions.
“Even prior to the Dobbs decision, abortion access in California was far from equitable—geographically, demographically, and racially,” said Shelby McMichael, a spokesperson for Planned Parenthood Affiliates of California. “Rural and underserved communities were, and in many places still are, abortion care deserts.”
New measures passed in California include:
▪ An amendment to the state constitution that enshrines abortion rights.
▪ Several laws protecting doctors who perform abortions for residents of other states.
▪ Enhancing privacy protections for people who get abortions.
▪ Allowing physician assistants and nurse practitioners to play a greater role in performing abortions.
▪ Starting a “Reproductive Health Services Corps” to train and encourage practitioners who work in underserved areas.
“California has implemented more than two dozen policies related to access and invested over $200M in reproductive health care,” McMichael said.
There were about 23 abortions per 1,000 women aged 15 to 44 in California during 2023, significantly higher than the nationwide rate of about 16 abortions per 100,000 women.
In 2023, California had the ninth-highest rate of abortions in America.
