Data reveals increase in deaths among mothers in abortion-banned states

The trend is correlated to abortion bans.

A new study shows that women who lived in states that ban abortion were significantly more likely to die during pregnancy, while giving birth, or soon after the birth of their child, compared to those who lived in states where abortion care was legal and accessible, our analysis shows.

The Gender Equity Policy Institute released its study, Maternal Mortality in the United States After Abortion Bans, this month. It found several eye-opening things.

“The number of women in America who die in pregnancy, childbirth, and soon after giving birth is tragically high,” the report concluded. “This is true throughout the country. Nevertheless, as this report has documented, women in states that banned abortion are at significantly higher risk of maternal death, and longstanding racial disparities in maternal mortality are significantly worse in banned states.”

Mothers living in states that banned abortion nearly twice as likely to die during pregnancy, childbirth, or soon after giving birth, compared to mothers living in supportive states where abortion was legal and accessible. Maternal mortality rose 56 percent in Texas in the first full year of the state’s abortion ban, including an increase of 95 percent among White women.

Still, women of color are disproportionately affected. Black mothers living in banned states were 3.3 times as likely to die as White mothers in those states. Latina mothers in Texas faced nearly triple the risk of maternal mortality as those in California.

One of the interesting contrasts made was between Texas and California. Texas is the second most populous state in the country, and a larger number of maternal deaths would be expected there than in less populous states.

However, comparing Texas to the country’s most populous state, California, illuminates how perilous it is to a woman’s health to be pregnant in Texas. California had the lowest maternal mortality rate of any state reporting data in 2023. At 9.5 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births, it was roughly half the rate of the United States overall (18.6).

In 2023, Texas’s maternal mortality rate was 155 percent higher than California’s.

The rest of the report is here.