Fate of Louisiana Abortion Clinics Hinges on Supreme Court Emergency Request
Louisiana’s three remaining abortion clinics are in jeopardy after Fifth Circuit’s Rogue Ruling
01.25.19 - (PRESS RELEASE) – Today, the Center for Reproductive Rights filed an emergency motion
with the United States Supreme Court asking it to block a Louisiana
law designed
to shutter abortion clinics throughout the state. The law, set to go
into effect on February 4, would require physicians performing abortions
to have admitting
privileges at a local hospital. In a rogue decision, the Fifth
Circuit violated Supreme Court precedent and upheld the law in September and denied a petition for rehearing from the Center for
Reproductive Rights.
An identical admitting privileges law in Texas was declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in 2016 in Whole
Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt, a case brought by the Center for Reproductive
Rights. The Supreme Court recognized in Whole Woman’s Health that requiring abortion providers to have admitting
privileges “provides few, if any, health benefits for
women, poses a substantial obstacle to women seeking abortions, and constitutes
an ‘undue burden’ on their constitutional right to do so.”
“The
Fifth Circuit brazenly ignored recent U.S. Supreme Court precedent
squarely on point,” said Nancy Northup, president and CEO of the Center
for
Reproductive Rights. “We are filing an emergency motion today with the
Supreme Court to block this law before women in Louisiana are
harmed. There is no way this law can stand under the Supreme
Court ruling in Whole Woman’s Health, which struck down the same law in Texas.”
In September 2018, a three-judge panel of
the Fifth Circuit issued a split 2-1 ruling upholding Louisiana’s admitting privileges law. In his dissent, Judge Patrick E.
Higginbotham criticized the majority for using “beyond strange” reasoning to
evade Supreme Court precedent and said the decision “ought not stand.”
Subsequently, the Center for Reproductive Rights submitted a petition urging
the entire Fifth Circuit to rehear the case and correct the panel’s failure to
follow Supreme Court precedent. The petition was denied.
The law at issue, Act 620, would require
any physician providing abortion services in Louisiana to have admitting
privileges at a hospital within 30 miles of the procedure. There is no medical
justification for this requirement, as the complication rates for abortion are
extremely low. In fact, the rate of major complications requiring
hospitalization is 0.05% for abortions in the first trimester and approximately
1% in the second trimester. Hospitals frequently deny admitting privileges to doctors who provide
abortions for reasons ranging from ideological opposition to the fact that too
few of their patients will ever need hospital care.
Louisiana
ranks among the lowest in the
country in terms of abortion access, with about 312,000 women of
reproductive age per clinic. Since 2001, the number of abortion clinics
in Louisiana
has fallen from 11 to three as the state has imposed increasingly
onerous restrictions on abortion providers. The Center
for Reproductive Rights and Louisiana health care providers are
currently
challenging many of these other medically baseless restrictions in two
other lawsuits.
This
case was originally filed in August, 2014 by the Center for
Reproductive Rights on behalf of three women’s health centers, doctors
and their patients, with local counsel Larry Samuel.
###
MEDIA CONTACT: Kelly Krause; kkrause@reprorights.org; 917-637-3649
Cases:
- Issues:
- Regions:
- News types:
- Work:
