For Immediate Release: May 2, 2024
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SBA, CLI Submit Comments on Guidance from the TX Medical Board
Washington, DC – Women who experience an emergency during pregnancy continue to have access to lifesaving care under Florida’s heartbeat law, according to a rule announced by the Florida Agency for Health Care Administration Wednesday afternoon. The rule calls on hospitals to write policies for doctors who act under the pro-life law’s ‘life of the mother’ provision and includes examples of conditions that can require immediate treatment such as premature rupture of membranes, ectopic pregnancy, and trophoblastic tumors.
The guidance comes as Joe Biden, Kamala Harris and Democrats like state Sen. Lauren Book have falsely said “women and girls will die” because of a physician’s inability to treat life-threatening conditions under pro-life laws. Yesterday on X, Jason Weida, Secretary of AHCA, called out the misinformation on the heartbeat protection:
“The pro-abortion left is lying for political gain. The attempts to demonize standard healthcare for women make a physician’s job more difficult and can put a pregnant woman’s life at risk. The Heartbeat Protection Act protects women from life-threatening complications while protecting the life of the unborn.”
As the Texas Medical Board considers a similar rule on their state’s pro-life law, SBA Pro-Life America and the Charlotte Lozier Institute this week submitted comments encouraging Med Ed guidance to educate doctors. The comments emphasize the importance of doctors relying on their “reasonable medical judgment” and that the law does not require a health emergency to be immediate for a doctor to act, but that it allows for intervention when a serious situation is foreseeable.
In the comment from the Charlotte Lozier Institute, Dr. Ingrid Skop, M.D., FACOG, and a practicing OB-GYN in Texas, writes:
“Texas law does not require that a mother’s risk of death or ‘serious risk of substantial impairment of a major bodily function’ be immediate. . . Physicians understand that it is difficult to predict with certainty whether a situation will cause a woman to become seriously ill or die, but all physicians know what situations could lead to these serious outcomes. At the time of diagnosis of a potentially life-threatening pregnancy complication, a physician must be reassured that the law allows intervention.”
Every state with a pro-life law allows women to receive emergency care. In March, South Dakota became the first state in the nation to establish a Med Ed law to end the confusion caused by the abortion industry through direct education to medical professionals. In addition to Florida and Texas, other states have taken similar steps administratively, including Oklahoma and Kentucky attorneys general who have issued advisory opinions.
Under South Dakota’s HB 1224, training materials will be established through the Department of Health and with input from the attorney general, medical professionals and legal experts. The video will cover the details of the state’s abortion law, the most common medical conditions that threaten the life or health of a pregnant woman, the standards of care for treating a pregnant woman in a medical emergency, and a practitioner’s ability to use reasonable medical judgment in all situations.
Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America is a network of more than one million pro-life Americans nationwide, dedicated to ending abortion by electing national leaders and advocating for laws that save lives, with a special calling to promote pro-life women leaders.
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