Today, the Society of Family Planning’s #WeCount project released updated abortion estimates. The project found that in 2024, 1,142,230 abortions were performed — a reported increase of more than 8 percent from the previous year. A key finding from the #WeCount report was that over 21 percent of all abortions that took place in 2024 were done via telehealth. This #WeCount report has already received a great deal of coverage from several media outlets including The Hill, the Wall Street Journal, Axios, the Associated Press, and ABC News.
Not surprisingly, there is less here than meets the eye. An important reason why the #WeCount project reported increasing abortion numbers in 2024 is because it started counting telehealth abortions only in July 2023. It is certainly plausible that telehealth abortions became more prevalent in 2024. However, the fact that the project counted no telehealth abortions in the first six months of 2023 certainly skews the numbers. It also means that the overall 2024 abortion estimates should not be directly compared with the overall 2023 estimates.
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