Study finds pro-life laws have saved thousands of babies since Dobbs

By: Michael Foust, originally published February 27, 2025, Pregnancy Help News

A new study indicates that pro-life laws have saved thousands of babies from abortion.

The study published online by the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) examined birth certificate and census data in states where abortion is either outright banned or prohibited after six weeks of pregnancy.

The findings revealed an estimated 22,180 “excess births” reported in states with laws protecting the unborn.

“Fertility rates in states with abortion bans were higher than would have been expected in the absence of these policies,” the study found.

The study covered all 50 states and the District of Columbia, spanning 2012 through 2023. The U.S. Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade in June 2022 in the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health decision. 

Pro-life leader Michael New, a senior associate scholar at the Charlotte Lozier Institute and Assistant Professor of Social Research at the Catholic University of America, said the study is cause for celebration within the pro-life community.

“It is heartening to see an analytically rigorous study demonstrate the lifesaving effects of pro-life laws,” New wrote in an online analysis at National Review.

He said that the JAMA study likely underestimated the total number of additional births, and understated the impact of more recent pro-life laws.

“First, it considers only the effects of state abortion bans and heartbeat acts. The impact of other gestational age limits was not considered in the JAMA study,” New said. “Second, it fails to consider the impact of certain pro-life laws, such as those in Ohio and South Carolina, that were in effect for a limited period. Finally, litigation in states where abortion remained technically legal may have had an impact, as some facilities might have been reluctant to perform abortions.”

The study’s authors found an “estimated 1.01 additional births above expectation per 1,000 reproductive-aged females in states following the adoption of abortion bans.” These “excess births,” the study found, were largest among “racially minoritized individuals, those without a college degree, Medicaid beneficiaries, unmarried individuals, younger individuals, and those in southern states.”

Some state pro-life laws, such as those in Texas, had a “larger impact than others,” New said.

“However, every abortion ban or heartbeat act was correlated with an increase in the state fertility rate,” he wrote. “In short, every pro-life law that was analyzed saved lives.”

The JAMA study isn’t the first analysis to highlight the positive impact of pro-life laws.

In 2023, a study by the Institute of Labor Economics examined data from the first six months of that year and found that births rose by an average of 2.3 percent in states with abortion bans. That study estimated there were 32,000 additional annual births resulting from abortion bans.

New noted how the Jama study was the latest research findings to support the benefit of pro-life laws in his analysis.

“This JAMA study adds to a nice body of research which shows that recently enacted pro-life laws are increasing fertility rates and saving lives,” he said.

New acknowledged that overall abortion numbers have not declined as much as pro-life advocates had hoped since the overturning of Roe. Even so, “pro-lifers should take heart,” he wrote.

“A growing body of research is showing that recently enacted pro-life laws are, in fact, saving thousands of lives,” New said.

Michael Foust is a writer for Pregnancy Help News.