(Reuters) – The U.S. Supreme Court decision overturning the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision paves the way for about half of the 50 states to ban or heavily restrict women’s access to abortions.
The first restrictions will take effect in 13 states with so-called trigger laws https://www.guttmacher.org/state-policy/explore/abortion-policy-absence-roe# designed to be enacted once the ruling is struck down.
The states are Arkansas, Idaho, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah and Wyoming, according to the Guttmacher Institute, an abortion rights advocacy research group.
Some trigger laws ban abortions almost completely, while others will outlaw abortion after six weeks or 15 weeks.
How quickly those trigger laws will go into effect will vary. Some will be rapid.
For example, Arkansas’ trigger law takes effect as soon as the state attorney general certifies that Roe has been overturned, the Guttmacher Institute says.
In Texas, a near-total ban on abortion will go into effect 30 days after the Supreme Court decision.
WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?
The Guttmacher Institute estimates a total of 26 U.S. states https://states.guttmacher.org are certain or likely to ban abortion, leaving women in large swaths of the U.S. Southwest and Midwest without nearby access to the medical procedure.
Most states where abortion will still be legal are on the West Coast (California, Nevada, Oregon and Washington) or in the Northeast. Governor Gavin Newsom of California, the most populous state, proposed enshrining a right to abortion in the state’s constitution.
A handful of states in the Midwest and Southwest are expected to keep abortion legal such as Illinois, Kansas, Minnesota and New Mexico, according to the Guttmacher Institute.
Under that scenario, a woman in Miami, Florida, might have to fly to another state or drive 11 hours, or more than 700 miles (1,100 kilometers), to reach North Carolina, where abortion is expected to remain legal.
Colorado, Connecticut, Maryland, New Jersey and Vermont have passed legislation this year seeking to protect or expand abortion access.
CAN PILL PRESCRIPTIONS OVERCOME STATE BANS?
Conservative states have already rushed to restrict abortion pills, which can be prescribed through online telemedicine visits. Now that the court has overturned Roe v. Wade, they will be able to ban them altogether, experts say.
Thirty-two states allow only physicians to dispense abortion pills, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. Six states, including Texas and Missouri, ban any use of telemedicine for medication abortion.
Another 21 states do not have blanket bans but require at least one in-person visit https://www.kff.org/womens-health-policy/issue-brief/the-intersection-of-state-and-federal-policies-on-access-to-medication-abortion-via-telehealth, meaning patients cannot simply have a telemedicine appointment and receive the pills by mail, according to the foundation.
(Compiled by Lisa Shumaker; Editing by Howard Goller)
