Colorado bill requires ‘stabilizing’ abortions, says ERs must have willing staff always available

Legislators in Colorado have introduced a new bill stating that emergency room doctors must commit induced abortions that are “necessary to stabilize the patient.” Senate Bill 130 also orders that a staff member must be available to commit abortions “at all times,” but includes an exception for workers who refuse to commit abortions for moral reasons.

Induced abortion is not considered the standard of care or stabilizing care for any health condition. In addition, the federal Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act (EMTALA) already states that emergency rooms must provide emergency medical care to all patients, which makes parts of this bill appear redundant.

Under Colorado law, abortion is considered “any medical procedure, instrument, agent, or drug used to terminate a pregnancy of an individual known or reasonably believed to be pregnant with an intention other than to increase the probability of a live birth.” It’s a confusing way of saying that the intent of the procedure is a dead baby. However, it also makes it unclear whether treating a natural miscarriage is conflated with induced abortion within this wording, as the bill also fails to specifically mention miscarriage care in its list of “reproductive health care”:

“Reproductive health care” means health care and other medical services related to the reproductive processes, functions, and systems at all stages of life. It includes, but is not limited to, family planning and contraceptive care; abortion care; prenatal, postnatal, and delivery care; fertility care; sterilization services; and treatments for sexually transmitted infections and reproductive cancers.

Induced abortion — the direct and intentional act of killing a preborn child before delivery — is not medically necessary even in emergency situations, but is already completely legal in Colorado for any reason throughout pregnancy. If the pregnancy is being “terminated” in an emergency, it is a disservice to the child’s parents and the baby to take actions in an attempt to ensure the death of that child.

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If a pregnancy must end to protect the mother’s life or health, the doctor can carry out a C-section or induced delivery. These are not considered abortions because the intent is not to ensure the baby dies. If the child is too young to survive, this would still not be an induced abortion, as the child was not actively and intentionally killed, but died as a result of the necessary preterm delivery. Babies born as young as 21 weeks have survived with proper, specialized medical care.

The new bill states, “An emergency department shall not deny or discriminate in providing emergency services to a patient because of the patient’s sex, including pregnancy and pregnancy outcomes; ability to pay for medical care; insurance status…”

It continues, “An emergency department shall implement a protocol to ensure a health-care provider is available at all times who is willing and able to provide emergency medical services in accordance with this section. This section does not require a health-care provider to provide emergency medical services if the emergency medical services conflict with the health-care provider’s sincerely held religious beliefs.”

There are reportedly 15 Catholic acute care hospitals operating in Colorado.