Women seeking abortions in the south have found North Carolina to be a welcome sight since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned a piece of landmark legislation in Roe v. Wade.
A New York Times article published on Saturday found the state's abortion providers are struggling to keep up with the increased demand since the decision became public last summer.
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The state experienced a 37 percent jump in abortions between April and August of 2022, according to WeCount, an abortion-tracking project. In Many cases, women travel from neighboring states with more restrictive abortion laws.
North Carolina providers performed 3,190 abortions in April. In August, they performed 4,360, making for the biggest increase of any state in the U.S. Kansas (36 percent), Colorado (33 percent) and Illinois (28 percent) also saw similar increases.
The data does note that the estimated number of abortions provided in the South Atlantic region (Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, and West Virginia) actually decreased from 19,290 abortions in April to 18,150 abortions in August.
In 2022, Gov. Roy Cooper issued an executive order to enhance women's access to reproductive health care in North Carolina, where abortion is legal through 20 weeks of pregnancy, unless there's a medical emergency.
Planned Parenthood estimates that more than a third of its abortion patients in North Carolina are from out of state.