Bad Medicine for Women
Published: November 6, 2012
No one should expect a post election letup in the continuing courtroom fights over state efforts to restrict women’s access to safe and legal abortions. Two important cases — one in the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, in San Francisco, the other in the Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, in Cincinnati — show how intense these battles have become and how important it is for basic women’s rights to prevail.
Related
Lawsuit Tries to Block New Arizona Abortion Law (July 13, 2012)
Connect With Us on Twitter
For Op-Ed, follow@nytopinion and to hear from the editorial page editor, Andrew Rosenthal, follow@andyrNYT.
The Ninth Circuit case tests the constitutionality of an Arizona law, signed by Gov. Jan Brewer in April, that bans all abortion procedures beyond 20 weeks from a woman’s last menstrual period, or about 18 weeks after fertilization. The law, part of a broader anti-abortion package, is the most aggressive of the “previability” abortion bans enacted recently by a handful of states because it outlaws abortion two weeks earlierLike the other laws, Arizona’s defies Supreme Court precedent barring states from banning abortions before the fetus has reached a point where it can survive outside the womb, which generally occurs about 24 weeks after the woman’s last menstrual period.
In July, a federal district judge in Phoenix, James Teilborg, defied that precedent and upheld the Arizona law by wrongly characterizing what was plainly a blanket ban as a permissible “regulation” that limits only “some” previability abortions. His ruling gave short shrift to concerns that severe fetal abnormalities sometimes cannot be diagnosed before 20 weeks. At a hearing Monday, a three-judge panel seemed skeptical of the judge’s attempt to redefine the previability ban as a mere regulation, a scepticism we hope will prevail in the final ruling.
Meanwhile, another setback for women in Ohio urgently needs review. Last month, a three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit upheld a 2004 Ohio law that limits a woman’s right to choose to have a first-trimester abortion with the drug mifepristone, rather than undergoing surgery. The law and the ruling defy accepted medical wisdom. The law says that mifepristone may be administered only in the same exact dosage approved by the Food and Drug Administration a dozen years ago, and its use is restricted to the first 49 days of pregnancy.
Medical knowledge has advanced significantly since then, and the F.D.A.-approved regimen is now outdated. By mandating a protocol that is no longer medically supportable, Ohio’s law leaves women who might safely opt for a medication abortion between 49 and 63 days of pregnancy with only a surgical option. Women who choose a medication abortion earlier in the first trimester are forced to consume three times more medication than needed, increasing the risk of side effects.
Incredibly, the panel found that the law did not violate women’s constitutional right to privacy or bodily integrity. The full appeals court should grant Planned Parenthood’s request for a rehearing, then strike down a law that denies access to a safe, widely used method for terminating a pregnancy.
No comments:
Post a Comment