1 in 3 women of reproductive age now live over an hour away from an abortion clinic, study finds
CBSN
One in three women of reproductive age in the U.S. now live over an hour away from the closest abortion clinic, according to a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association on Tuesday. Before the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June, the average travel time to a clinic was less than 30 minutes.
The peer reviewed study, which appeared in JAMA's latest issue, "Health Care Access and Reproductive Rights," used census data from nearly 64 million women between 15 and 44 years of age in 48 states — excluding Alaska and Hawaii. Data found that the average woman's travel time has more than tripled, and that abortion seekers now travel for more than 100 minutes on average to reach a legal clinic.
In the three-month span between the Supreme Court's June 24 decision and Sept. 30, which the study's authors defined as the "post-Dobbs" period, over a dozen states had enacted total or near-total abortion bans. The "pre-Dobbs" data was taken from January to December 2021.
