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The Texas Supreme Court docket held a listening to on the state’s medical exception to its abortion bans. Plaintiffs together with girls and medical doctors say the legislation is endangering lives in sophisticated needed pregnancies.
JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
At a listening to in Austin in the present day, the justices of the Texas Supreme Court docket heard a case in regards to the state’s abortion ban – particularly about whether or not the medical exemption within the bans are too narrowing and complicated. NPR’s Selena Simmons-Duffin has been following this case intently and is right here to inform us extra. Hello, there.
SELENA SIMMONS-DUFFIN, BYLINE: Hello, Juana.
SUMMERS: All proper. So Selena, earlier than we dig into what occurred in the present day, lay out the case for us. Who’s suing, and what are they asking for?
SIMMONS-DUFFIN: So this case was introduced by the Heart for Reproductive Rights, and so they’re representing 20 sufferers who had critical being pregnant problems however had been denied abortions or confronted delays and in addition two OB-GYNs who say they cannot observe drugs correctly as a result of the abortion bans are unclear. And in the event that they interpret them incorrectly, they might face life in jail and the lack of their medical license. In order that they’re asking the court docket to make clear the medical exception in order that medical doctors have extra leeway to make use of their judgment to offer abortions once they take into account it medically essential.
SUMMERS: And what’s it in regards to the abortion legislation within the state of Texas that they are saying just isn’t clear?
SIMMONS-DUFFIN: So there are at present three overlapping abortion bans. Abortion is illegitimate within the state from the second being pregnant begins. There’s a medical exception that claims abortions are allowed if the lifetime of the affected person or a, quote, “main bodily perform” are in jeopardy. And the state has been fiercely defensive in regards to the legislation. And so they say – attorneys for the state say the language of the medical exception is evident and adequate, and so they counsel that medical doctors are chargeable for any harms that the sufferers declare on this case.
SUMMERS: Huh. OK, so what occurred in the present day? Give us among the highlights.
SIMMONS-DUFFIN: Effectively, proper off the bat, the justices requested about this query of readability. That is Beth Klusmann. She was arguing for the Texas legal professional normal’s workplace. She solely made it lower than a minute into her opening assertion when she was interrupted by Justice Debra Lehrmann.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
DEBRA LEHRMANN: Are you able to give us a – only a bright-line rule about what medical emergency means?
BETH KLUSMANN: Your Honor, I can solely level the court docket to what the legislature has stated that the – what the medical emergency exception means – the life-threatening, bodily situation that is induced or aggravated by a being pregnant that places a girl vulnerable to dying or substantial danger of great impairment of a significant bodily perform.
LEHRMANN: And also you acknowledge that that places medical professionals in a very dangerous scenario?
KLUSMANN: No, Your Honor, I do not suppose it does.
SIMMONS-DUFFIN: This was a theme of the listening to. Is that language unclear? And whether it is, what is the function of the state Supreme Court docket to make clear the statute? The justices actually appeared to wrestle with this query. And one other huge theme was standing. So Texas has argued that not one of the sufferers have standing to sue as a result of they had been harmed up to now, and any future hurt is theoretical. Right here is how the Heart for Reproductive Rights legal professional Molly Duane responded to that argument within the courtroom in the present day. And only a warning – her feedback are pretty graphic.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
MOLLY DUANE: Then the court docket can be saying {that a} affected person must have blood or amniotic fluid dripping down their leg earlier than they’ll come to court docket. And fairly clearly, sufferers in these conditions are rather more involved with getting correct medical care and saving their lives, their fertility and their households than they’re with discovering a lawyer and coming to court docket.
SIMMONS-DUFFIN: A number of of the justices appeared, to me, to agree that not less than among the plaintiffs do have standing and that there’s confusion amongst medical doctors and that the dearth of readability within the legislation because it stands is problematic.
SUMMERS: OK. And Selena, what does this imply for abortion within the state of Texas? What comes subsequent?
SIMMONS-DUFFIN: Effectively, for now, abortions are nonetheless banned in Texas. What’s subsequent is the Texas Supreme Court docket must determine if the medical exception ought to change briefly because the case continues by the authorized system. The choice might come within the subsequent few weeks, however the timing is not straightforward to foretell. That is what Professor Liz Sepper of Texas Regulation in Austin instructed me.
LIZ SEPPER: It can rely an important deal on getting settlement. This case, I believe, turned extra tangled the extra that the justices pulled on the thread.
SIMMONS-DUFFIN: She additionally stated that, watching the listening to in the present day, it was laborious to get a learn on the entire court docket, however she does suppose there is a good probability this case will proceed to trial, which is scheduled for subsequent April. And the listening to on the injunction was – within the district court docket final July – was actually dramatic. You had 4 sufferers testifying about their sagas with critical problems, medical doctors not even keen to say the phrase abortion to them. Some needed to journey to different states. Two plaintiffs developed sepsis whereas ready for Texas hospitals to offer abortion. So if the trial does go forward within the spring, it is going to positively be one to look at.
SUMMERS: NPR’s Selena Simmons-Duffin. Thanks.
SIMMONS-DUFFIN: Thanks.
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