142,000 Women Crossed State Lines for Abortions in 2025: Journey Got Harder and Costlier After Bans

How long do women in the US have to travel to get an abortion?

New data shows that fewer women crossed state lines for an abortion in 2025 than in either of the two preceding years, but the journey out of a total-ban state has lengthened from 2.8 hours to 11.3.

Women who left a state with a total abortion ban between June 2022 and June 2024 travelled an average of 11.3 hours to reach care. Those treated in their own state before the ban took effect travelled 2.8 hours. Overnight stays rose from 5% of cases to 58%, and mean travel costs climbed from $179 (£131) to $372 (£273).

Nationally, an estimated 142,000 women crossed state lines for an abortion in 2025, the Guttmacher Institute reported on 24 March 2026. The new figures are down from 154,000 in 2024 and from a peak of more than 169,000 in 2023.

In the US, the Supreme Court ended the constitutional right to abortion on 24 June 2022 in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization. Thirteen states had total bans in force as 2025 closed, and six more banned abortion at six or 12 weeks of gestation.

By December 2025, no brick-and-mortar clinic was providing abortion care in any of the 13 states. Those states had a total of 62 clinics in 2020.

What the Abortion Funds Are Spending

Abortion funds, non-profit groups that help people pay for abortion care and travel, cover coach fares, motel rooms, and even childcare expenses. The National Network of Abortion Funds said the average amount spent per person supported more than doubled between 2022 and 2025, from $188 (£138) to around $396 (£290).

Nearly a third of the 97 funds surveyed said they had paused their hotlines at some point, citing funding shortages, staff burnout, legal barriers, security concerns, and political attacks.

'The need is growing even faster than available resources,' said Poonam Dreyfus-Pai, the network's interim executive director.

Telehealth and the Shield Law Cases

Among residents of the 13 total ban states, travel dropped to 62,000 in 2025. Telehealth provision to those states rose to 91,000, from 74,000 a year earlier, under shield laws in eight states that protect clinicians regardless of where the patient is.

In December 2024, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton sued Margaret Carpenter, a doctor in New Paltz, New York, and a co-founder of the Abortion Coalition for Telemedicine. He alleged she had posted abortion pills to a woman in Collin County. Carpenter did not appear. On 14 February 2025, a judge there entered a default judgment of $113,000 (£82,829) and barred her from prescribing to Texans.

A Louisiana grand jury indicted her in January 2025 over pills sent to a pregnant minor. Governor Jeff Landry signed an extradition warrant. New York Governor Kathy Hochul refused it.

Texas then moved to enforce the judgment in New York. Taylor Bruck, then acting clerk of Ulster County, twice rejected the filing in 2025, citing the state shield law. Paxton sued him. Justice David Gandin dismissed that petition on 31 October 2025, ruling that Carpenter's work was legal in New York. Texas appealed on 15 May 2026, and the case is still pending.

What the Research Says About Cost

Women who travelled out of state paid an average of $1,367 (£1,002) out of pocket, against $411 (£301) for those treated in state. That survey of 675 people was conducted in the first half of 2019, before Dobbs. Costs were catastrophic for 65% of the travellers, meaning they took at least 40% of monthly income left after subsistence needs.

Women denied an abortion for arriving past a clinic's gestational limit saw debt at least 30 days overdue rise by $1,750 (£1,283), a 78% increase on their pre-birth average. Bankruptcies, evictions, and tax liens on their credit files rose 81%.

The effects lasted five years. Sarah Miller, Laura Wherry, and Diana Greene Foster reached those figures in 2023 by linking a decade of credit records to their Turnaway Study.

Two papers in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) on 13 February 2025 measured wider effects.

Across the first states to impose complete or six-week bans, researchers counted about 22,180 more births than expected between 2021 and 2023. Infant mortality there ran at 6.26 deaths per 1,000 live births against an expected 5.93, an estimated 478 additional deaths.

Isaac Maddow-Zimet, the Guttmacher data scientist who led the travel research, said interstate travel remains 'a critical option for many,' particularly for patients seeking care later in pregnancy.

The abortion drug Mifepristone is approved for use only up to 10 weeks of gestation.

Guttmacher's data, however, excludes abortions obtained outside the formal healthcare system.