As of Wednesday, May 1, most abortions in Florida after six weeks will be illegal.
The state’s previous 15-week ban passed in 2022 went into effect a month ago when the state Supreme Court overruled a 34-year-old decision that said a privacy provision in the state constitution protected a woman’s right to terminate a pregnancy. But that ruling also triggered a more restrictive 6-week ban passed by the Florida Legislature last year to go into effect 30 days later.
That means Florida is no longer the southern state with the least restrictive abortion laws. Floridians needing or wanting abortions after six weeks of pregnancy would need to travel to North Carolina, where the limit is 12 weeks, or up to Virginia where there are no laws banning abortion.
Previously Florida was the destination for people in the South with little or no access to abortion services, more than 25,000 in the last five years, according to the nonprofit site KFF Health News.
Abortion is currently banned in 14 states, limited to gestational periods between six and 12 weeks in five, between 15 and 22 weeks in 6 more, and has no bans in 25 states and Washington, D.C. according to nonprofit KFF. Many GOP-led states rushed to enact abortion bans after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade in 2022.
However, the Florida Supreme Court also ruled that a proposed constitutional amendment about abortion could go on the November ballot this year. If voters approve it, Florida’s abortion laws would go back to more or less what they were when Roe v. Wade was still in force.