The Center for Reproductive Rights has filed complaints in three states, including Idaho, to ensure patients “in dire situations can access abortion care and doctors have clarity on ‘medical emergency’ exceptions in their state’s abortion bans.”
The other states in the complaint are Tennessee and Oklahoma, which also have abortion bans in place. Tennessee’s law banned all abortions and included an “affirmative defense” for doctors, according to the Associated Press, which means the burden was on the physician to prove an abortion was medically necessary, not the state. Oklahoma's law makes abortion illegal in nearly all cases, except life-threatening situations.
The Center for Reproductive Rights is representing eight plaintiffs who were denied care, and also a local Idaho medical association and four physicians who say they are not able to provide care because the bans threaten them with “harsh criminal, financial and professional penalties,” according to a news release from the Center.
“In their ruthless quest to ban abortion, Idaho politicians are endangering pregnant people and driving so many physicians out of state that Idaho’s entire medical system is on the brink of collapse,” said Gail Deady, Senior Staff Attorney at the Center in the release. “While politicians are doing everything they can to hide the harms caused by Idaho’s extreme abortion bans, the plaintiffs today are standing up to speak the truth about how these laws are putting the health and safety of all Idahoans at risk.”
The complaints filed in Idaho are brought on behalf of four women who were denied abortion care, two physicians and the Idaho Academy of Family Physicians. It challenges the scope of Idaho’s near-total ban and the six-week ban. The lawsuit seeks to clarify and expand the exceptions under Idaho’s two bans to ensure doctors can provide abortion care for the pregnant person's health and in cases of fatal fetal diagnosis.
