Florida saw the largest decline in abortions last year of any state, new report shows

After Florida’s restrictive abortion law took effect last May, banning most abortions after six weeks of pregnancy, the state saw a dramatic decline in abortions, despite a slight increase nationally.

According to a new report from the Guttmacher Institute, Florida saw the largest drop in abortions provided of any state last year, as a former regional hub for abortion access in the South. Florida’s statewide total dropped from an estimated 85,770 abortions in 2023, when Florida had a 15-week limit in effect, to 73,710 in 2024.

This represents a 14 percent decline, standing in stark contrast to a rise in the number of abortions that occurred last year in the U.S. total.

“We have this kind of stable overall story, and then a very complicated mix of declines and increases at the state level, because what is happening in one state is really affecting what’s happening in other states,” said Isaac Maddow-Zimet, a lead data researcher for the Guttmacher Institute, in an interview with Orlando Weekly.

Florida, South Carolina, Colorado and New Mexico saw the steepest declines in abortions provided last year, while Virginia, Kansas, Wisconsin and Ohio saw the largest increases — attributed in part to people traveling from other states for abortion care, and in Wisconsin’s case, due to a ban on abortions there being lifted.

Data for states with total abortion bans in effect (there are 12 total) were not included in the Guttmacher Institute’s report, so researchers expect their numbers to be an undercount.

Maddow-Zimet, a researcher of 15 years for the research nonprofit, said one of the findings he was most surprised by is how travel across state lines remains a major way that people are accessing abortion care.

The number of people who traveled out of state for care in the U.S. more than doubled from 81,100 in 2020 — before the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the constitutional right to abortion — to 169,700 in 2023. That number declined slightly in 2024, to 155,100, but still remains significantly above 2020 levels.

“I think the thing that’s in some ways surprising about that is that we know that that travel is incredibly costly, needs an enormous amount of support from providers, from practical support organizations, from abortion funds — and so it is really somewhat surprising that it has been able to be maintained,” said Maddow-Zimet, adding, “It speaks to the real motivation on the part of both patients and people supporting patients to make sure that people can access care.”

With abortion access now severely restricted in Florida, many Floridians who need an abortion are now traveling to states like Virginia, Illinois, New York and North Carolina — the closest state (still hundreds of miles away) where abortion access isn’t completely banned or as restricted.

Still, North Carolina has a 72-hour waiting period law, requiring anyone seeking an abortion to make two separate appointments with a medical provider at least 72 hours apart.

For someone who has a full-time job (or multiple jobs), a family, or other barriers that make travel difficult — such as arranging childcare — this can create a logistical nightmare.

“It can be really a burden, and that really is only overcome because there is this broad support network that has sprung up in order to provide wraparound care, to help cover the cost of abortion,” said Maddow-Zimet.

One group in that network is the Florida Access Network, a statewide abortion fund that helps remove financial and logistical barriers to abortion care for people with limited resources. Ginnely Carrasco, deputy director of FAN, told Orlando Weekly they’ve seen out-of-state travel increase more than 53 percent since Florida’s six-week ban took effect last May.

“Many people do not know they are pregnant until around eight weeks, so by the time they were being seen in Florida, it was already too late to receive care here,” Carrasco shared in a statement.

Abortion procedures can cost hundreds of dollars out-of-pocket, and insurance plans on the Marketplace in Florida generally don’t cover it. But beyond the financial burden of an abortion procedure itself, in addition to gas, food, and hotel stays, Carrasco said that unfamiliarity with travel can also be a hurdle. “Even if they have a support person with them, many of our clients have never left Florida before and are doing so under challenging circumstances.”

As of last November, Floridians were the largest group of people traveling to New York from out-of-state for abortion care, The City reported at the time, drawing from data from Planned Parenthood and an abortion fund there. Virginia, where abortion is legal up to viability, is the second-closet location to Florida where abortion is more accessible.

But logistically, traveling up there can be difficult. “I know a lot of people are trying to go to Virginia, but unless you’re driving, flights and hotels aren’t always the easiest,” Bree Wallace, executive director of the Tampa Bay Abortion Fund, told Orlando Weekly. “They kind of get expensive at times, too.”

Abortion bans can have negative health impacts, are tied to higher rates of infant deaths, and can put abortion providers — and other health professionals who treat pregnant people — in risky positions. In Florida, the penalties for violating the state’s abortion ban can include prison time, fines, and loss of one’s medical license. Some clinicians, and clinician groups, have spoken out against Florida’s abortion ban, arguing the law is “endangering patients’ health and survival and impairing clinicians’ ability to comply with their ethical obligations and medical standards of care.”

Florida is currently home to 49 licensed abortion clinics — a drop from 71 roughly a decade ago. Orlando has two licensed abortion clinics, one private and another operated by Planned Parenthood. Still, there are some states across the country where all abortion clinics have fully shuttered, particularly in the South.

A proposed constitutional amendment on the Florida ballot last year sought to overturn the state’s six-week abortion ban, by legalizing abortion up to viability. It got 57 percent of the vote — more than six million votes from Floridians total — but fell short of the 60 percent threshold it needed to reach in order to pass.

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This article appears in Apr 23-29, 2025.