With federal abortion protections eliminated in a watershed U.S. Supreme Court decision, California is preparing for a flood of out-of-state women seeking abortions as it positions itself as a stronghold for reproductive rights. Most lawmakers are even willing to foot the multi-million-dollar bill.
But amid all the politicking one crucial question remains unanswered: How does California plan for a significant increase when it doesn’t know how many abortions are currently performed in the state?
Although almost every other state tracks abortion information — including how many people arrive from out of state — California is one of three that does not. The California Department of Public Health has not kept track of any abortion data since 1997. When CalMatters asked why, the agency did not provide an answer.
“Having a lack of information and data is sometimes an issue,” said Jessica Pinckney, executive director of ACCESS Reproductive Justice, which provides funding for those who can’t afford abortions.
“Every journalist and every legislator I’ve talked to in the past six months wants to know how many people are coming to California,” Pinckney said.
A recent brief from UCLA’s Center on Law, Reproductive Health, and Policy estimated that post-Roe, 26 states would ban all or nearly all abortions — prompting between 8,000 and 16,100 more people to travel to California seeking abortions each year.
Yet as of today, there’s no centralized system collecting information on how many Californians are obtaining abortions here. Individual clinics and hospitals in California know how many procedures they perform, but it’s hard to get the full picture on abortions and how much they cost, Pinckney said. State officials said the new Health Care Payments Database, which tracks insurance claims, should capture abortion procedures and medication, but the information likely won’t be available until the end of next year.