The Quickie: Indiana Abortion Ban Remains Blocked
For Immediate Release: Oct. 13, 2022
Welcome to “The Quickie” — Planned Parenthood Action Fund’s daily tipsheet on the top health care & reproductive rights stories of the day. You can read “The Quickie'' online here.
In today’s Quickie: Indiana abortion ban remains blocked, key midterm races for abortion access, Florida abortion ban leads to denial of assault survivors’ care, and employers step up to cover reproductive health care!
INDIANA ABORTION BAN REMAINS BLOCKED: Yesterday, the Indiana Supreme Court issued an order that continued to block the enforcement of Indiana’s abortion ban until at least January when the court will begin hearings on the case. The Indiana Supreme Court’s decision allows abortion access up to 20 weeks of pregnancy to continue in the state, denying a request from the state’s attorney general office to end the preliminary injunction on the ban.
Senate Bill 1 (S.B. 1), a highly restrictive abortion ban, went into effect September 15, but was blocked by a lower court a week later and has remained blocked by various courts since then. Now, the Indiana Supreme Court will evaluate the merits of the case, in which Planned Parenthood and other plaintiffs have argued that the abortion ban violates Hoosiers’ state constitutional right to privacy. Leaders from Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Planned Parenthood Great Northwest, Hawai‘i, Alaska, Indiana, Kentucky, ACLU of Indiana, Whole Woman’s Health Alliance, All-Options, the Lawyering Project, and Women’s Med said in a joint statement:
“It is a tremendous relief to know that abortion will remain accessible and legal in Indiana while we continue to fight this ban in court. Since the reversal of Roe, Indiana has become a critical state for abortion care in the region. We hope that the Indiana Supreme Court agrees with the lower court that the Indiana Constitution ensures that Hoosiers have the right to access abortion. What matters most is that Hoosiers will continue to be able to maintain control over their own bodies, families, and futures without aggressive and dangerous interference from lawmakers.”
Read more at AP and the Guardian.
COSMOPOLITAN TEAMS UP WITH PLANNED PARENTHOOD ACTION FUND TO BRING ATTENTION TO FIVE KEY MIDTERM RACES TO PROTECT ABORTION ACCESS: In a first-of-its-kind partnership, Cosmopolitan and the Planned Parenthood Action Fund have identified five races with thepotential to impact reproductive freedom across the country. The feature zeroed in on governor races in Pennsylvania and Arizona, the attorney general race in Michigan, the North Carolina state assembly, and the Ohio Supreme Court race. Over the next few days we will share more about each of these races, but here is what Planned Parenthood Action Fund President Alexis McGill Johnson had to say about the importance of the midterms: “It’s critically important that we use our voices and our votes to take back some of the control we’ve lost. Casting our votes in November brings us a step closer to the country we want to see: one where people can govern their own bodies, lives, and futures.”
Read the full feature at Cosmopolitan and tune in the next five days as we feature key midterm races to protect abortion access.
FLORIDA ABORTION BAN DENIES ASSAULT SURVIVORS CARE: Yesterday, Planned Parenthood of South, East, and North Florida (PPSENFL) reported in a press call that at least two young survivors of incest were denied abortions under the Florida’s ban after 15 weeks of pregnancy. The abortion ban, in effect since July 1, has no exceptions for rape or incest, forcing survivors to travel out-of-state for care. Both two survivors were past the ban’s limit, so PPSENFL helped arrange travel for them and their families multiple states away to get them life-saving care.
"The cruelty of forcing a very young person, who has already survived a horrible case of violence, to give birth, it just takes away their rights to bodily autonomy, and it is really turning a blind eye to what is happening in our society," PPSENFL Vice President of Public Policy Laura Goodhue said.
PPSENFL has seen an increase in young people and survivors of rape, intimate partner violence, and incest seeking abortion. Many cannot access abortion in Florida because they are past 15 weeks of pregnancy, often unknowingly, forcing providers to turn away people in vulnerable situations or try to arrange travel to several states away as Florida’s neighboring states have also banned abortion.
“We are seeing this restriction have profound and terrible effects for some families in the most desperate of situations," Dr. Shelly Tien, an OB-GYN and abortion provider at PPSENFL, said. “To not be able to provide that service because of the restriction for a patient in such a terrible and violent situation is horrible."
Read more at Buzzfeed News.