STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
On June 24, it will be four years since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, which had given women the right to abortion nationwide. Now we have new information on abortions from the Society of Family Planning. And what do you know? The number of abortions has gone up. There are nearly twice as many abortions occurring in the United States as before the ruling. Kate Wells is with our partner KFF Health News, and she's going to explain how this happened. Hi there, Kate.
KATE WELLS, BYLINE: Hey, Steve.
INSKEEP: How could it be that the number of abortions would go up so dramatically at a time when something close to half the states have restricted access?
WELLS: Yeah, well, the short answer is telehealth. It used to be that you could only get the abortion pill mifepristone by actually going to see a doctor in person. The FDA removed that restriction during the pandemic, and then in 2022, when Roe v. Wade fell, we saw this proliferation of these online and telehealth companies that will essentially mail you the pill to your home over state lines. And that has made it easier in places like Louisiana to get these abortion pills now than it was, you know, when Roe v. Wade was still the law of the land. That is obviously not the outcome that states like Texas and Louisiana wanted, and that's why we're seeing them sue over this access.
INSKEEP: Oh, this is very interesting. Could those lawsuits put telehealth out of business?
WELLS: Well, the telehealth companies don't really think so. And we kind of got a sense of why they feel very confident right now last month. I don't know if you remember, but Louisiana's lawsuit made it up to the Supreme Court. It's gotten the furthest. And during that fight, there was this weekend in May where it became effectively illegal to mail one of the two abortion pills, mifepristone. But it didn't actually change anything. The telehealth providers that I was talking to, they had a backup plan, which was just mail out the other abortion pill, misoprostol.
I talked with Dr. Angel Foster. She's with the Massachusetts Medication Abortion Project. And she said during that weekend, they went to their patients who had already ordered these pills and said, we can give you a refund, we can wait to see if the legal landscape changes, or we can mail you misoprostol. But she warned them, you know, if you have a medication abortion with just misoprostol, it can take longer. It can be more painful. I can even be slightly less effective.
ANGEL FOSTER: And the vast majority of our patients wanted misoprostol only. They didn't care. Their response was, whatever can get to me fastest.
INSKEEP: Meaning that, in spite of all the restrictions, people are finding the opportunity to do what they want to do.
WELLS: Right. Because the way that people access abortion now has just fundamentally changed. You know, even if you can't mail mifepristone, telehealth providers will use misoprostol. If the telehealth providers in the U.S. get shut down, patients are already getting these medications from outside the U.S. People are still going to be able to get them.
INSKEEP: How do abortion opponents feel about this reality that they've won in so many places, and the number of abortions has almost doubled?
WELLS: Yeah, they are frustrated. And they're especially frustrated with the Trump administration, which they expected would do more to crack down on this access to these pills by now. I talked with Kristi Hamrick. She's with Students for Life of America. And she said, look, they appreciate a lot of the things the administration has done on this, like cutting Medicaid payments to Planned Parenthood. But she says they want to see more.
KRISTI HAMRICK: That doesn't get to the fact that the No. 1 way in which babies die in the womb in America today is biochemical abortion pills.
WELLS: You can just see very clearly where the battle lines are right now. This is about access to medication abortion over the internet. It's completely changed the game, and that is where this fight is going to be.
INSKEEP: Kate Wells with our partner KFF Health News. Thanks so much.
WELLS: You're welcome. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.
