Vanessa Carlton Wants You to Know Women Are Traveling ‘A Thousand Miles’ for Abortion

“I had an ectopic pregnancy and without abortion care, I could have died,” Carlton said in a new campaign. “I’m grateful to be able to use my song to bring attention to the public health crisis.”

By Kylie Cheung  |  October 24, 2024 | 5:51pm
Photo: Screenshot Abortion
Vanessa Carlton Wants You to Know Women Are Traveling ‘A Thousand Miles’ for Abortion

This year, Vanessa Carlton’s famed song “A Thousand Miles” turned 23. And, believe it or not, we actually had more rights when the song came out than we do now. This cold truth isn’t lost on Carlton, who’s using her song to bring attention to the chaos wrought by state-level abortion bans across the country.

In a two-minute video released with the Center for Reproductive Rights, “A Thousand Miles” plays as we follow a woman from Texas to a different state to access abortion care. 

“I had an ectopic pregnancy and without abortion care, I could have died,” Carlton says at the end of the video. “I’m grateful to be able to use my song to bring attention to the public health crisis we’re facing in this country.” Carlton previously shared her abortion experience in 2022, in the months after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v.Wade. She recounted being devastated by the decision, until Stevie Nicks—who’s also shared the story of her abortion from 1979—invited Carlton to join her on tour.

In the same video, CRR states, “Last year abortion bans forced 170,000 Americans to go out of state for reproductive care.” A landing page for Carlton and the Center’s partnership lists several key statistics, including that one in five abortion patients are now forced to travel out-of-state, and a quarter of Americans live in states that enforce criminal abortion bans.

In June, the abortion fund Florida Access Network shared that ever since the state began enforcing a six-week abortion ban, the average distance their clients have to travel for care sits at 900 miles. The Brigid Alliance, an organization that helps traveling abortion patients pay for the massive associated costs, told Jezebel earlier this year that the average distance their clients need to travel increased by 30% between 2022 and 2023, from 1,000 miles to 1,300.

Guttmacher Institute first reported in June that over 170,000 people traveled out-of-state for abortion care in 2023, the first full year after Roe fell. Guttmacher data scientist Isaac Maddow-Zimet said in a statement at the time that “traveling for abortion care requires individuals to overcome huge financial and logistical barriers,” which is “neither normal nor acceptable.” Brigid also told Jezebel that from 2021 to 2023, travel-related costs increased 16% from $836 to $993 per client, and in that same period, average lodging costs increased 29% from $242 to $345.

About half of all states currently have total or near-total abortion bans in place, and Republican officials are increasingly trying to restrict abortion-related, interstate travel, too. 

“People are being forced to travel away from their friends, their family, and their communities in order to get essential health care even in the middle of a medical emergency. It is heartbreaking and it is wrong,” Carlton concludes in the video. “Abortion is health care.” 

 
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