California requires public universities to provide the abortion pill to students. But how much they pay for the medication differs dramatically by campus.
At California State University, Long Beach, students pay $52 for a medication abortion.
A few miles away at Cal Poly Pomona, it’s free.
For University of California students, the bill could be as high as $700.
So why do costs differ widely across the 33 universities? For the California State University system, it’s all down to how each of the 23 campuses spent $200,000 in private grant money. At the 10 University of California campuses, the cost of a medication abortion depends largely on whether a student chose the university’s health plan.
Most of the university websites do not list how much a student is charged for a medication abortion, if it’s mentioned at all.
What is the law?
California legislators in 2019 passed the law that requires all of the state’s public university campuses to provide abortion pills. The law took effect in January 2023.
“We wanted to make sure that students, female students, had access to this right,” said Connie Leyva, the former Pomona-area state senator who authored the law.
Public universities are supposed to make the pills as cheap as possible, if not free.
What is a medication abortion?
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Medication abortion uses a combination of two federally approved drugs to end a pregnancy. It does not require a surgical procedure.
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The first pill is mifepristone, which blocks a hormone known as…
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