Supreme Court refuses to strike down Arkansas abortion law

The Supreme Court has refused to hear a challenge to an Arkansas abortion law mandating admitting privileges for any abortionists who commit medication abortions. After the law was passed in 2015, Planned Parenthood quickly sued, calling the law unconstitutional and medically unnecessary, even though the law merely complies with FDA standards.

The law requires abortionists to contract with another doctor who has admitting privileges, and Planned Parenthood claimed that there were no doctors willing to partner with any of Planned Parenthood’s abortionists… which would cause their facilities in Little Rock and Fayetteville to have to close. “It would make Arkansas the only state to effectively ban medication abortion,” Planned Parenthood said. “The restriction would eliminate entirely a safe, common method of early abortion and force all women in the state to travel to a single provider in Little Rock to have a surgical procedure, thereby preventing many women from obtaining an abortion altogether.”

1st Trimester Medical Abortion: Abortion Pills

Yet while Planned Parenthood claimed not being able to commit medication abortions would completely shutter their facilities, Arkansas pointed out that just 14 percent of Arkansas women who underwent abortions had medication abortions — and that complications were not uncommon.

Previously, a judge blocked enforcement of the law, until the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals ordered that the case be sent back to the trial judge to determine if women would be unfairly burdened by the contract requirement, and requested that the Supreme Court review the ruling. But with the Supreme Court refusing to hear the case, the stay on the law will be lifted.

Medication abortions have potential for more complications than the abortion industry likes to admit, including death from sepsis, infection, and undiagnosed ectopic pregnancies.

Lawyers for the state point out that the law is common sense and protects women, as it only requires “medication abortion providers to have a contractual relationship (to ensure follow-up treatment if needed) with a physician that has admitting privileges.”

Because of the law, it is possible that two of Arkansas’ three abortion facilities will be forced to close, leaving the state with just one abortion facility.