Nearly 65,000 rape-related pregnancies estimated after US abortion bans take effect

Washington: There were 65,000 rape-related pregnancies in US states where abortion was outlawed following the Supreme Court’s decision to curtail women’s reproductive rights, according to new research.

With abortion looming as a major flashpoint in this year’s election, a new study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association has reignited concerns about the growing number of women being forced to travel interstate to terminate unwanted pregnancies, or who resort to “self managed” – and potentially unsafe – procedures.

An activist marks the first anniversary of the Supreme Court’s decision that overturned Roe v Wade, by displaying a neon sign in support of abortion access in front of the US Supreme Court.Credit: AP

According to the study, an estimated that 519,981 rapes were associated with 64,565 pregnancies during the four to 18 months that abortion bans were in effect in 14 Republican-led states.

But the researchers found that fewer than a dozen abortions each month were offered in states where rape exceptions are made, suggesting such exemptions are still not giving women the abortion access they need.

Texas – which has outlawed abortion, with no rape exceptions at all – had the highest number of rape-related pregnancies, with 26,313 in the 16 months since laws were implemented in that state.

Missouri came a distant second (5825), followed by Tennessee (4993), Arkansas (4655), Oklahoma (4529) and Louisiana (4287).

President Joe Biden speaks during an event on the campus of George Mason University in Manassas, Va., Tuesday, Jan. 23, 2024, to campaign for abortion rights, a top issue for Democrats in the upcoming presidential election. Credit: AP

The research will add fuel to an issue that is central to this year’s presidential election, which is shaping up to be an election rematch between Joe Biden and Donald Trump.

Democrats have already stepped up their campaign, rallying supporters earlier this month to “Restore Roe” – a reference to Roe v Wade, the 1973 landmark ruling that gave women in America the constitutional right to an abortion.

Biden and the Democrats have sought to blame Trump for abortion restrictions because the former president appointed three of the nine justices in the US Supreme Court, where conservatives now hold a 6-3 majority.

The conservative majority supported overturning the law, deeming it unconstitutional.

“Across our nation, women are suffering and let us be very clear about who is responsible,” Vice President Kamala Harris said last week, standing alongside the president at a rally in Virginia.

“Former president Trump hand-picked three Supreme Court justices because he intended for them to overturn Roe.”

The Supreme Court repealed the law in June 2022 and left it to the states to determine what access, if any, women could receive. Since then, about 14 states banned abortion almost immediately, most with almost no exceptions at all.

Five of those 14 states have exceptions for rape, but they also have stringent gestational duration limits and survivors must report the rape to police to access abortion services, which disqualifies many women who don’t wish to report.

Vice President Kamala Harris speaks before President Joe Biden at an event on the campus of George Mason University in Manassas, Virginia.Credit: AP

On the campaign trail, Trump has sought to balance his Supreme Court legacy with the fact that the vast majority of Americans believe abortion should generally be legal.

While campaigning for the Republican nomination in recent months, Trump’s position has been less extreme than some of his rivals and he has occasionally blamed the extreme policies of the anti-abortion movement for the GOP’s recent electoral losses.

He also favours exemptions for rape, incest and the life of the mother and has criticised the six-week ban enacted by former rival, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis.

DeSantis withdrew from the race after a disappointing result in the Iowa caucuses, leaving Trump’s former ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, as his last remaining challenger for the nomination.

Haley has tried to take a more balanced position on abortion, declaring herself “unapologetically pro-life” while advocating for finding a national consensus on abortion access.

The latest research, based on an analysis of multiple data sets, was conducted by Dr Samuel Dickman, a medical director at Planned Parenthood of Montana; Kari White, a reproductive and health policy expert; and David Himmelstein, a professor of public health at the City University of New York.

“In this cross-sectional study, thousands of girls and women in states that banned abortion experienced rape-related pregnancy, but few [if any] obtained in-state abortions legally, suggesting that rape exceptions fail to provide reasonable access to abortion for survivors,” the authors write.

Pro-life demonstrators hold a banner during the March for Life 2020 rally in Washington as Trump became the first US President to attend the event.Credit: Bloomberg

“Survivors of rape who become pregnant in states with abortion bans may seek a self-managed abortion or try to travel [often hundreds of miles] to a state where abortion is legal, leaving many without a practical alternative to carrying the pregnancy to term.”

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