Wednesday, January 23, 2013

By The Numbers: Abortion Rights On The 40th Anniversary Of Roe v. Wade

Tuesday is the 40th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the landmark Supreme Court decision that ensures legal access to abortion services. But four decades after Roe gave women the freedom to make their own reproductive choices, the reality for women in the U.S. isn’t so clear cut — even though more Americans now support legal abortion than ever before, abortion rights are under serious attack across the country. Here’s the current state of abortion rights in the U.S., by the numbers:

  • 135: Number of new state-level abortion restrictions enacted over the past two years. 2011 and 2012 represented the worst years for reproductive freedom since the 1973 Supreme Court decision.
  • 87: Percentage of U.S. counties that don’t have an abortion clinic. At least four states — North Dakota, South Dakota, Arkansas, Mississippi — only have a single abortion clinic left.
  • 45: By the time American women reach this age, nearly half of them will have had an unintended pregnancy at some point in their lives. About one in three will have had an abortion.

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