Missouri Gov. Greitens signs law to stop Planned Parenthood from endangering women

Missouri’s pro-life governor, Eric Greitens, signed SB5 into law Wednesday. SB5 modifies current abortion law in Missouri and enacts new pro-life regulations, making Missouri a safer place both for women and for babies in the womb. The Senate voted 22-9 in favor of SB5.

Gov. Greitens issued a statement on the victory, saying:

These new protections for women and babies were passed in a special legislative session Gov. Greitens called this summer. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports that the law:

Gov. Greitens called the special session partly in response to a disturbing 2016 Missouri Senate Report, which revealed numerous violations of safety at the St. Louis Planned Parenthood. Live Action News reported last year on the troubling details:

Excerpt from the Missouri Senate Report on Planned Parenthood Practices

The Senate’s Report’s concluded:

The St. Louis Planned Parenthood alone sent its 65th patient to the hospital this year. Now, SB5 gives the attorney general, Josh Hawley, the authority to prosecute violations of abortion law. As U.S. News reports, “Supportive Republican lawmakers have said they want to give the attorney general new authority out of concern that a local prosecutor, particularly in a Democratic-leaning city, might not pursue potential abortion-law violations.”

Additionally, SB5 provides protections for people who report violations of safety standards in abortion facilities. Among other things, SB5 also:

• Requires “annual, unannounced, on-site inspections and investigations of abortion facilities.”

• “[C]reates the crime of interference with medical assistance if an employee of an abortion facility knowingly orders or requests medical personnel to deviate from any applicable standard of care or ordinary practice while providing medical assistance to a patient…” This aspect of the law is a response to the practice cited in the 2016 Senate Report where abortion facilities asked that ambulances not turn on their sirens when responding to medical emergencies at the abortion facilities.

While women’s lives may not be in as grave of danger at Missouri abortion facilities and while some women will likely reconsider an abortion decision in the 72-hour waiting period, children are still losing their lives every day. The St. Louis Planned Parenthood commits medication abortions, aspiration (D&C abortions), and D&E abortions every day of the week except Sunday. Abortions are committed up to 21 weeks, 6 days. Science has documented that babies can conclusively feel pain no later than 20 weeks, and some studies indicate pain is felt by the prenatal child as early as 5.5 weeks.

A summary of SB5 can be accessed here. The law will go into effect 90 days after passage.

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