Most state abortion bans have limited exceptions − but it’s hard to understand what they mean

By Naomi Cahn, University of Virginia, Sonia Suter, George Washington University

More than a year after the Supreme Court found there is no fundamental right to get an abortion, 21 states have laws in effect that ban abortion well before fetal viability, generally allowing it only in the first trimester.

Fourteen of these 21 states have also issued near-total bans on abortion from the point of conception. But it’s not clear when, if ever, an abortion would be permissible under these near-total bans.

Virtually all states, including Arkansas, North Dakota and Oklahoma, for example, allow an abortion when necessary to save the life of the pregnant person. But the laws don’t explain just how close to death the person must be before the abortion can be performed.

Some states, such as Georgia, Indiana and West Virginia, also include exceptions for health concerns, rape, incest or lethal fetal anomalies.

Most of these exceptions are vaguely worded, leaving physicians and pregnant patients to navigate whether a particular abortion would be legal.

As experts on reproductive health and justice, we are trying to untangle just what these different medical exceptions mean. This is an important question for legal experts, but also for doctors and caregivers, as well as people who are pregnant and their families – all trying to make sense of the various bans in effect.

Steep penalties, murky legal language

Because these different state laws use nonmedical language and threaten steep penalties – such as life imprisonment – for performing an abortion that violates the statute, some physicians have been turning to lawyers for guidance.

For example, Tennessee has an exception that allows abortions “necessary to prevent the death of the pregnant woman or to prevent serious risk of substantial and irreversible impairment of a major bodily function of the pregnant woman.” And West Virginia allows abortions for “nonviable” fetuses, defined as those with a “lethal anomaly … incompatible with life outside of the uterus.”

Read Full Story https://theconversation.com/most-state-abortion-bans-have-limited-exceptions-but-its-hard-to-understand-what-they-mean-221389