Ectopic Pregnancy Deaths Have Nearly Doubled. It’s Worse in Abortion-Ban States.
A ProPublica analysis reveals that deaths from ectopic pregnancies have nearly doubled between 2020 and 2025. The report suggests that state-level abortion restrictions may be causing medical providers to delay or refuse life-saving care due to fear of criminal prosecution.
Why it matters
This highlights a critical intersection between reproductive healthcare policy and maternal mortality rates in the United States.
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The number of women who died after an ectopic pregnancy has spiked in recent years, a ProPublica analysis found. The mounting deaths in Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data have drawn little scrutiny or response.
Such deaths typically occur in the first trimester, after a pregnancy fails to properly implant in the uterus and begins to develop elsewhere, most commonly inside a fallopian tube. The embryo grows until it causes the organ to rupture, triggering catastrophic bleeding.
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