Washington.- The Supreme Court on Monday left in place a decision banning emergency abortions that violate the law in Texas, which has one of the strictest abortion bans in the country.
Without explanation, the high court left in place a lower court’s ruling that hospitals cannot be forced to perform emergency terminations of pregnancies that violate Texas law. There was no public dissent.
President Joe Biden’s administration had asked the Supreme Court to throw out the lower court ruling, arguing that hospitals are required to perform emergency abortions under federal law. The government pointed to a previous Supreme Court decision in a similar case on record from Idaho, in which the justices narrowly allowed emergency abortions while a lawsuit continues.
The federal government also cited a Texas Supreme Court ruling that doctors do not have to wait until a woman’s life is in immediate danger before legally performing an abortion. According to the US government, this brings Texas into line with federal law and means that the lower court ruling is not necessary.
Texas asked the U.S. Supreme Court to keep the order in place, arguing that the state court’s ruling means that Texas law, unlike Idaho’s, does have an exception to protect women’s health and that there is no conflict between federal and state laws.
Doctors have said the law remains dangerously vague after a medical board refused to specify exactly what conditions qualify as an exception.
Reports have recently increased that pregnant women with medical problems have been turned away from emergency rooms in Texas and other states, as hospitals debate whether standard care could violate strict anti-abortion laws.
Terminating a pregnancy has always been part of medical treatment for people with serious complications as a way to avoid sepsis, organ atrophy or other problems. But in Texas and other states, doctors and hospitals have said it is not clear whether such terminations violate abortion bans that carry prison sentences.
The Texas case began after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, leading to abortion bans in several Republican-governed states. The Biden administration issued guidance saying hospitals were still required to perform emergency abortions, under a health law that requires most hospitals to care for any sick patient.
Texas sued against that directive, arguing that hospitals cannot be forced to violate the state’s abortion ban. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth District ruled in favor of Texas, saying in January that the U.S. government had exceeded its authority.
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