The abortion rate in the U.S. has dropped to its lowest level since the procedure was legalized in 1973.
According to a new report by the Guttmacher Institute, in 2017, the U.S. abortion rate dropped to 13.5 abortions per 1,000 women between the ages of 15 and 44.
That's the lowest it's been since the Supreme Court's Roe vs. Wade decision, which made abortion legal in the U.S.
The overall number of abortions has gone down, too. In 2017, an estimated 862,320 abortions were performed in clinical settings in the U.S. — a 7% decline since 2014.
The report notes that almost 400 state laws restricting abortions were enacted between 2011 and 2017 — but that legislation likely isn't the main reason behind the declining numbers. Instead, it cites a decrease in the birth rate, improvements in contraception use and other factors as possible reasons.
