TAMPA BAY, Fla. — Women's health services across the country are seeing an increase in demand for contraceptives since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, allowing states to enact their own laws on abortion.
The court ruled on June 24, and by the beginning of July, Florida enacted a 15-week and six-day abortion ban.
In the last two months, Planned Parenthood of Southwest and Central Florida said they’re not only seeing a surge in demand for birth control but also reproductive procedures.
“We're definitely seeing more patients request appointments for contraception, particularly long-acting contraceptives, people seeking appointments for vasectomy, for tubal ligations — so permanent sterilization,” Planned Parenthood abortion care physician Dr. Sujatha Prabhakaran said.
Within 24 hours of the Supreme Court decision, the national women's telemedicine company Wisp saw a 3,000% surge in demand for its emergency contraception, which is also referred to as a “morning after” pill or pill for abortion.
As of September, Wisp told us sales are up 10%.
Additionally, clinics in Florida are experiencing much longer wait times.
The state’s abortion law now requires a patient to have two appointments at least 24 hours apart in order to get the procedure, pushing available appointments from days to now weeks out.
“The wait times, unfortunately, for appointments continue to get longer because when they added the 24-hour waiting period, that meant more visits to the health centers,” Prabhakaran explained.
Despite the 15-week ban, clinics are also getting an influx of patients from out of state.
A map from the Center For Reproductive Rights shows that Florida is the only southern state from North Carolina to Texas that even allows abortion after six weeks.
“Pretty much every other southern state either bans abortion outright or bans abortion around the six-week point," Tampa Bay Abortion Fund board member and volunteer McKenna Kelley said. "Which at that point, most people don't even realize they're pregnant."
The Tampa Bay Abortion Fund said they’re just now starting to see a surge in demand for their financial help.
“We're just now kind of starting to see our calls pick up both from people who are needing to leave the state because they're at that 15-week point and they can no longer access abortion in Florida and from people who are coming into Florida to access care in the Tampa Bay area.”
Prabhakaran added that she has seen the longer wait times put Floridians past the 15-week mark.
“Sometimes patients don't realize, you know, how far along they are then if they have to wait a week or two for an appointment that can put you know them beyond the limit of care here in Florida. So I've already seen patients where that has happened,” she said.
Both Planned Parenthood and the Tampa Bay Abortion Fund are ramping up programs to help women travel further north or west for care if needed.
“Paying for plane tickets [was] not originally in our budget,” Kelley said, “So we are building a separate budget, a separate fund, specifically for that travel.”
Planned Parenthood, along with several clinics and activist groups, filed a lawsuit against the ban at the beginning of July.
They are also appealing a temporary stay order to stop the ban while the lawsuit is pending.
In addition, clergy members from five religions have also sued the state, claiming the ban violates freedom of speech and religion, specifically, clergy members’ ability to counsel people about abortion since Florida law prohibits counseling a crime.
South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham also proposed a national 15-week ban on abortion this week.
