Hunter
07/29/25
A year after a new state law effectively banning abortions after six weeks, the number of Iowans having the procedure in-state has dropped, but has resulted in an uptick in women traveling to other states to seek abortions.
The Iowa law included exceptions when the pregnancy involves some cases of rape, incest, the life or health of the mother, or a fetal abnormality judged by a doctor to be incompatible with life.
The Gazette reports since the new state law went into effect one year ago, the rate of abortions in Iowa has declined by more than half, while the number of Iowa women traveling to neighboring states to seek abortions has in some cases as much as doubled.
Lyz Lenz, a former columnist for the Gazette and current board chair for Iowa Abortion Action Fund, says the law makes abortion harder to access and more costly for the people who need them the most.
Planned Parenthood reports that it has seen a 182 percent increase in Iowa women seeking abortions at their Nebraska and Minnesota clinics, and have added exam rooms at their facilities closest to the Iowa border.
Iowa has had the worst ratio of OBGYN specialists per population in the US. Back in 2017, the ratio was 3.3 specialists per 10,000 women of reproductive age, well below the national average of 45 OBGYN’s per capita. Since then, the number of OBGYNs in Iowa had dropped by 4.1 percent, before the new restrictions were enacted.