Post by Logan on Jun 22, 2016 8:35:36 GMT -6
Public hospitals must provide abortions on site if they also offer maternity services, a Washington state judge said Tuesday.
The ruling from Skagit County Superior Court Judge Raquel Montoya-Lewis concerns the state’s third-largest public hospital district, Skagit Regional Health, and Skagit Valley Hospital in Mount Vernon, which routinely refers patients to Planned Parenthood when they seek abortions.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Washington sued the district in 2015 as part of a campaign to make sure public health-care facilities follow the state’s abortion rights law, the Reproductive Privacy Act, passed by voter initiative in 1991.
The law prevents the state from interfering with a woman’s right to have an abortion, requires the state to pay for voluntary abortions for low-income women, and says that if a public hospital provides maternity services it must also provide “substantially equivalent” abortion services.
Read more: www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/health/court-public-hospitals-must-provide-abortions-on-site/
The ruling from Skagit County Superior Court Judge Raquel Montoya-Lewis concerns the state’s third-largest public hospital district, Skagit Regional Health, and Skagit Valley Hospital in Mount Vernon, which routinely refers patients to Planned Parenthood when they seek abortions.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Washington sued the district in 2015 as part of a campaign to make sure public health-care facilities follow the state’s abortion rights law, the Reproductive Privacy Act, passed by voter initiative in 1991.
The law prevents the state from interfering with a woman’s right to have an abortion, requires the state to pay for voluntary abortions for low-income women, and says that if a public hospital provides maternity services it must also provide “substantially equivalent” abortion services.
Read more: www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/health/court-public-hospitals-must-provide-abortions-on-site/