ACLU sues Alabama to save one of its last second-trimester abortion clinics

The American Civil Liberties Union is suing Alabama over its 2013 law requiring abortion clinics to have hospital admitting privileges, Life News reports.

Abortion defenders fear the law could lead to the closure of West Alabama’s Women’s Center, the last abortion clinic in Tuscaloosa, which provides approximately 40% of the state’s abortions and is one of only two in Alabama to offer second-trimester abortions. This would allegedly “put women at risk” according to Alexa Kolbi-Molinas, staff attorney for the ACLU’s Reproductive Freedom Project.

However, Life News notes that in 2013, investigators from the state Health Department found that WAWC failed to meet safety standards including hand washing, glove usage, supply cleaning, or safe use of sharps containers.

Live Action News has previously covered additional scandals at WAWC, including failures to document physician orders and records in 2010 or its own gestational age limits in 2011. Last month, the ACLU gave WAWC abortionist Gloria Grey its Baldwin Medal for “distinguished contribution[s] to the protection and promotion of human rights.”