FLORENCE, Ky. — A new study shows the number of patients traveling to other states for abortion care has more than doubled since 2019.
Spectrum News 1 spoke to the head of an organization that aims to help patients who’ve had negative abortion experiences.
She said the long-distance travel combined with different laws in different states has led to more people being taken advantage of.
Last year was the first full year in which abortions were not protected at the federal level, resulting in a record number of out-of-state abortions.
According to the reproductive rights group, the Guttmacher Institute, more than 171,000 patients left their state to receive care somewhere else. An increase in traveling for abortions was expected as states like Kentucky banned abortion services. The numbers show it has more than doubled since 2019.
Missy Martinez–Stone, president and CEO of the Center for Client Safety, said her organization is trying to help patients who’ve been hurt in the process by facilitating complaints against clinics. According to its website the Center for Client Safety "investigates, reports, and shuts down abortion businesses to protect vulnerable women and children from harm."
“To give them a little bit of justice for what they’ve experienced but also to help put an end to the bad actors that are taking advantage of how politicized this issue has gotten and the lack of oversight. There’s some really terrible people who take advantage of that, and women are harmed in the process,” Martinez-Stone said.
She said in the wake of the overturning of Roe v Wade, some states have adopted loose regulations for abortion care. Illinois is one state where many Kentuckians are traveling to, with 1,850 patients in 2023, Martinez-Stone said.
Ohio was right behind Illinois in the number of patients traveling from Kentucky for abortions, followed by Indiana before that state’s abortion ban went into effect.
Last year, a year after Roe v. Wade was reversed, Spectrum News 1 spoke with abortion rights groups about women traveling out of state for procedures. Planned Parenthood Alliance Advocates said the number of people traveling to its health centers in Indiana had more than doubled for out-of-state patients seeking a medication abortion, and surgical abortions increased more than 160%.
Nearly 25% of out-of-state patients in its Indiana health centers are Kentuckians, the organization said.
Reproductive Health Services of Planned Parenthood of the St. Louis Region’s health center in Fairview Heights, Illinois had a 35% increase in total abortion patients after Roe v. Wade was overturned, according to Reproductive Health Services of Planned Parenthood of the St. Louis Region.
More than 40% of abortion patients — a 700% increase — traveled to Illinois from outside of Missouri and Illinois, the organization said.
Planned Parenthood did not respond to a request for comment.
“How do we find a way to meet somewhere in the middle here so that these women who are scared and vulnerable are not paying the price for our unwillingness to be nuanced,” Martinez-Stone said. “Regardless of where you stand on abortion, you can get behind what we do because kind of take that step back and go, nobody wants a predatory physician who is actively harming women and sending them to the hospital.”