LOUISVILLE, Ky. (KT) – Between May and June 2023 four lives were lost to abortion in Kentucky.
Each of those abortions was performed on an unmarried Kentucky resident, one of whom was Hispanic and three of whom were “not Hispanic.” Other demographic information, such as age, race, the facility where the abortion was performed, previous live births and other terminations, has not been included in records provided to Kentucky Today by Kentucky’s Cabinet for Health and Family Services since July 2022.
All abortions in May were “drug induced,” according to records released by the Cabinet. The earliest was performed on a fetus at 14-weeks gestation. Two pregnancies were terminated at 19-weeks gestation, and one at 21-weeks gestation. The latter is the latest-term abortion performed in Kentucky since the state’s abortion ban was enforced on August 1, 2022. Only 10 abortions were performed that late in pregnancy in 2022 before abortion was made illegal.
June looked different.
In an email to Kentucky Today, a representative for the Cabinet noted that there were no records responsive to an Open Records Request submitted in July, stating: “The Cabinet’s Office of Vital Statistics has noted that, so far, zero (0) abortions have been reported to their office for the month of June 2023.”
Under Kentucky law, abortions must be reported to the Office of Vital Statistics within three days of the end of the month in which the abortion occurred.
June 24, 2023 marked one year since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, triggering Kentucky’s abortion ban. Since then, 294 abortions have happened in Kentucky—though 280 of those reported procedures happened in July 2022. That figure stands in stark contrast to the 4,485 abortions that happened between July 2021 and June 2022 in the year leading up to the nation’s highest court rolling back elective abortion as a federal right.
All data related to abortions provided in Kentucky are made available to the public through the Open Records Act.
Friends of Life KY 