LOUISVILLE, Ky. (KT) – In 2022, a total of 2,500 lives were lost to abortion in Kentucky. That’s according to records provided by the Cabinet for Health and Family Services, which has compiled abortion data reported by providers in compliance with Kentucky law since 2017.
The annual total does not factor in self-managed abortions using abortifacient drugs obtained without the prescription of a licensed Kentucky physician.
EMW Women’s Surgical Center performed 2,055 abortions between January and July; Planned Parenthood in Louisville performed 438 in the same timeframe. Four abortions were obtained at hospitals in Lexington and Louisville. The locations of the only three abortions reported to the Cabinet in August and October were not disclosed.
Women in their 20s accounted for 59% of abortions performed in 2022 between January and July. Women 30 and older obtained 806 abortions; teenagers 19 and younger obtained 207 abortions—10 of whom were under 15 years old. The ages of women who had abortions occurring after July are unknown.
Approximately 34% of women who obtained abortions in 2022 had never given birth to a child; 1,654 women had birthed at least one child. While 59% of women reported birthing between 1 and 3 babies, 172 women (6.8%) reported previously giving birth to between 4 and 9 children.
Over half of women reported a first-time abortion in 2022, while around 48% were obtaining at least their second abortion. Seven women combined returned for a 10th, 11th, 12th, and 13th abortion between January and July.
There were 2,291 pregnancies terminated during the first trimester and 209 abortions occurred during the second trimester. The latest-term abortions happened at 21-weeks gestation.
In a reversal of trends observed during the first half of 2022, surgical abortions outpaced medical abortions 51% to 49%. One pregnancy was ended via hysterotomy/hysterectomy, 114 through dilation and evacuation (D&E) and 1,158 using suction curettage. Abortifacient drugs accounted for the remaining 1,227 abortions.
Abortions in Kentucky were increasing on an annual basis until the Supreme Court issued the Dobbs decision on June 24, 2022, overturning the federal right to abortion granted by Roe v. Wade in 1973 and returning regulation of the procedure to the states. Kentucky’s near-total abortion ban was immediately triggered, eventually shuttering the commonwealth’s abortion providers while the law is challenged in court.
Only three abortions were reported between August 1, when a state appeals court allowed enforcement of Kentucky’s trigger ban, and December 31. The Cabinet informed Kentucky Today there were no records related to abortion for November 2022 or December 2022.
Kentucky entered 2023 with the trigger law still blocking access to abortion. The Ky. Supreme Court, which is considering a legal challenge against the ban, has not yet issued a ruling. Oral arguments were heard in November 2022, prior to turnover on the bench when former Chief Justice John Minton and Justice Lisabeth T. Hughes retired and were replaced by Angela McCormick Bisig and Kelly Thompson in early January.
Until the court delivers an opinion, abortions will only be performed in Kentucky to save the life of the mother or prevent significant injury to one of her life-sustaining organs.
All data related to abortions provided in Kentucky are made available to the public through the Open Records Act.
Friends of Life KY 