The Protection from High Risk and Coerced Abortion Act
– Summary of Nine Major Points –
- This bill will protect women from undergoing unwanted or contraindicated abortions. It will save the lives of their wanted children and save these women from an surgical operation that, at least in their unique high risk situation, is more likely to cause severe physical or psychological complications.
- Between 30% and 50% of women who have abortions are submitting to an unwanted abortion primarily because of pressure to abort from boyfriends, parents, husbands, or others. In order to protect women from feeling forced to undergo unwanted abortions, this bill would make clinics liable for failing to screen for coercion or for participating in such coercion.
- Many abortion clinics use cursory intake procedures by persons who are not qualified to do a proper psycho-social evaluation. As a result, many clinics neglect to screen patients for well known risk factors that predict physical and psychological problems after an abortion. Most of these risk factors have been identified by pro-choice researchers and are not in dispute. As many as 70 percent of abortion patients have one or more of these risk factors. Inadequate screening for risk factors means that doctors are not able to make an informed medical recommendation and patients are not being properly informed about the all the risks associated to an abortion relevant to their unique medical and psycho-social background. This bill will help to ensure that women receive proper screening for risk factors, are properly informed of any identified risk factors, and that physicians will be provided with this information so they can make an informed a medical recommendation for or against abortion.
- In describing the appropriate standard for informed consent, the Supreme Court has ruled that “imperative” that women considering abortion should be given “full knowledge of its nature and consequences” (Danforth, at 67). This bill helps to protect this right of women by making abortionist more properly liable for any failure to properly disclose to women information about risks and alternatives.
- It is known that some abortionists do not have any malpractice insurance. For this reason, some abortionists do not have admitting privileges at local hospitals. In such cases, the abortionist may not be in position to adequately treat an abortion complication. Furthermore, the lack of insurance can deprive an injured women of the opportunity to recover the costs of emergency medical treatment or lost wages. This bill would requires physicians who perform abortions to have admitting privileges at a reasonably accessible hospital.
- This bill provides for the State Department of Public Health to maintain an Abortion Information Depository where individuals and organizations can contribute information that may be relevant to a decision regarding an abortion to assist both physicians and the general public in obtaining up-to-date information about abortion alternatives, the risks of abortion, and risk factors,
- This bill will eliminate unnecessary obstacles in the way of women recovering damages for abortion related injuries. For example, it eliminates the need to secure the expert testimony of another abortionists to testify against the other abortionist. This bill ensures that any licensed obstetrician/gynaecologist shall be allowed to provide expert testimony regarding proper screening, counseling, and screening of women who have crisis pregnancies. This and similar provisions ensure that the standard of care in abortion clinics shall not continue to deteriorate simply because it is difficult for injured women to recover damages in civil proceedings.
- This bill recognizes that shame, grief, guilt, and emotional reactions to abortion can create a psychological disability that precludes women from being able to cooperate with counsel in seeking to recover damages. This bill remedies this problem by ensuring that women have a two year period of time after recovering from such a psychological disability to file their suit.
- To discourage illegal abortions, this bill provides women with a cause of action for recovering a minimum award of $400,000 in damages for reckless endangerment against any party who knowingly provides information or materials with the intent that they be used for self-abortions, which are inherently dangerous. A minimum award of $800,000 is provided for reckless endangerment against any person, other than a licensed physician, who attempts or completes an illegal abortion on a woman.
