The Arizona Department of Health Services on Wednesday released its annual report on abortions in the state. In response, Gov. Katie Hobbs said she wants Arizona to do away with its abortion reporting requirement.
The latest report compiles data on abortions performed in Arizona in 2023. It shows 12,705 abortions, or 8.8 abortions per 100,000 Arizona women, were performed that year. Those numbers are a notable decrease from 2021 – the last year before the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade – when 13,896 or 9.9 abortions per 100,000 women were performed.
Arizona enacted a 15-week abortion ban shortly after that ruling in 2022, and the impacts of that law are evident in the numbers. In 2021, 824 abortions were performed in Arizona on patients 16 weeks or more into a pregnancy. In 2023, just 21 abortions after 16 weeks were performed.
The state health department has tracked abortions in annual reports like this since lawmakers passed a law requiring the data in 2010.
The law requires hospitals or other facilities that provide abortions to report not just the number of abortions they perform each year, but also demographic information on patients, including race, age, marital status and education level. The reports also include survey responses from patients on why they sought an abortion.
Patients’ personal details are kept anonymous in the reports. Still, Hobbs calls the reports an invasive form of government surveillance and says the law requiring them should be repealed.
“This report is an attack on our freedom, is unacceptable, and must be brought to an end,” Hobbs said in a statement. “The government has no place in surveilling Arizonans' medical decision-making or tracking their health history. Starting a family is a sensitive and personal experience for a woman and her loved ones; there should be no room for government surveillance and publication of that decision.”
Dr. Jill Gibson, chief medical officer for Planned Parenthood Arizona, said in a statement the reports do nothing to improve patient safety and result in hours of additional work for providers.
“This type of reporting is medically unnecessary, and unfairly applied to abortion care,” Gibson said. “I am not required to report my patient’s personal health history to the government for any other type of health care.”
Democratic lawmakers earlier this year made an unsuccessful attempt to repeal the reporting requirement. But now that voters passed a measure to enshrine broad abortion rights in the state Constitution, this, and other abortion laws could face legal challenges.
“The fight for access to abortion is not yet over as we work to repeal more than 40 abortion-related restrictions we have in Arizona, including this reporting mandate,” Gibson said.
A lawsuit is already underway from group of Arizona doctors calling for courts to strike down Arizona’s 15-week abortion ban.
