CDCs Abortion Surveillance System FAQs
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When did CDC abortion surveillance start?
CDC began abortion surveillance in 1969 to document the number and characteristics of women obtaining legal induced abortions. Many states and reporting areas (New York City and the District of Columbia) conduct abortion surveillance. CDC compiles the information these reporting areas collect to produce national estimates. CDC’s surveillance system compiles information on legal induced abortions only.
How does CDC define abortion?
For the purpose of surveillance, a legal induced abortion is defined as an intervention performed by a licensed clinician (e.g., a physician, nurse-midwife, nurse practitioner, or physician assistant) that is intended to terminate an ongoing pregnancy.
Most states and reporting areas that collect abortion data now report if an abortion was medical or surgical. Medical abortions are legal procedures that use medications instead of surgery.
Are states required to report their abortion statistics to CDC?
No, states and areas voluntarily report data to CDC for inclusion in its annual Abortion Surveillance Report. CDC's Division of Reproductive Health prepares surveillance reports as data become available. There is no national requirement for data submission or reporting. States needing guidance on abortion surveillance may contact CDC at Contact CDC-INFO.
How is the report prepared and formatted?
Preparation of the Abortion Surveillance Reports is based on the data available from all states and reporting areas that voluntarily provide this information for a given calendar year. In addition, after CDC receives the data some additional time is required to perform the analyses that produce the tables, charts, and the narrative describing methods and trends. Please view the abstract and methods portion of the most recent Abortion Surveillance Report for more information on compilation of the report.
How is the Abortion Surveillance Report used?
This report is used for many purposes in the field of public health. In the past, it has been used to
- Identify characteristics of women who are at high risk of unintended pregnancy.
- Evaluate the effectiveness of programs for reducing teen pregnancies and unintended pregnancies among women of all ages.
- Calculate pregnancy rates, on the basis of the number of pregnancies ending in abortion, in conjunction with birth data and pregnancy loss estimates.
- Monitor changes in clinical practice patterns related to abortion, such as changes in the types of procedures used, and weeks of gestation at the time of abortion. This information is needed to calculate the mortality rate of specific abortion procedures.
Surveillance systems, such as this one, continue to provide data necessary to examine trends in public health.
Are data available for my own analysis?
In addition to the data available in the annual Abortion Surveillance Report, data from 2010–2013 also are available for abortions distributed by state of maternal residence and state of clinical service. These data are consistent with data reported to CDC for each year’s Abortion Surveillance Report. No additional data are available for public use. Search the National Library of Medicine’s MEDLINE/PubMed or MedlinePlus bibliographic reference for other abortion data.
Abortions Distributed by State of Maternal Residence and State of Clinical Service
2009—2013 - Download file: [XLS - 289KB]
2013 - Download file: [CSV - 10.1KB]
2012 - Download file: [CSV - 101KB]
2011 - Download file: [CSV - 10.1KB]
2010 - Download file: [CSV - 10.3KB]
2009 - Download file: [CSV - 11.1KB]
Abortion Surveillance—Findings and Reports
In 2013, 664,435 legal induced abortions were reported to CDC from 49 reporting areas. The abortion rate for 2013 was 12.5 abortions per 1,000 women aged 15–44 years, and the abortion ratio was 200 abortions per 1,000 live births.
Compared with 2012, the total number, rate, and ratio of reported abortions for 2013 decreased 5%. Additionally, from 2004 to 2013, the number, rate, and ratio of reported abortions decreased 20%, 21%, and 17%, respectively. In 2013, all three measures reached their lowest level for the entire period of analysis (2004-2013).
Women in their twenties accounted for the majority of abortions in 2013 and throughout the period of analysis. The majority of abortions in 2013 took place early in gestation: 91.6% of abortions were performed at ≤13 weeks’ gestation; a smaller number of abortions (7.1%) were performed at 14–20 weeks’ gestation, and even fewer (1.3%) were performed at ≥21 weeks’ gestation. In 2013, 22.2% of all abortions were early medical abortions. The percentage of abortions reported as early medical abortions increased 5% from 2012 to 2013. Source: MMWR.2016;65(12);1–44.
- Page last reviewed: January 6, 2017
- Page last updated: January 6, 2017
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