A federal judge in Austin last week struck down a 2017 Texas law requiring health care facilities to bury or cremate fetal remains.
In an order permanently blocking the law, U.S. District Judge David Alan Ezra said in court that it would have been difficult for facilities to find medical waste vendors willing to participate in the burials or cremations, according to the Texas Tribune.
The 53-page court decision says the law violated the Equal Protection and Due Process clauses of the 14th Amendment.
"The lack of capable and reliable options to dispose of embryonic and fetal remains in compliance with the challenged laws would likely cripple the ability of health care providers to offer surgical abortions and thus is a substantial obstacle in the path of women seeking a previability abortion,” Judge Ezra wrote. “As the disposal system is currently structured, implementation of the challenged laws would likely cause the shutdown of women's health care providers unable to patch together a hodgepodge of funeral homes, crematoriums, and cemeteries to meet their disposal needs. Women would experience further limited abortion access in a state where such access had already been greatly diminished.”
The law, which took effect in September of 2017, sets new standards on the disposition of fetal remains and outlaws so-called “partial birth abortion.”
The decision also says if the law went into effect now, it “would likely cause a near catastrophic failure of the health care system designed to serve women of childbearing age” in Texas.
In a statement released after the ruling, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said his office would “continue fighting to honor the dignity of the unborn.”
“We established during a weeklong trial in July that the law is constitutional and does not impact the abortion procedure or the availability of abortion in Texas,” the attorney general said in the statement. “My office will continue to fight to uphold the law, which requires the dignified treatment of fetal remains, rather than allow health care facilities to dispose of the remains in sewers or landfills.”
The Texas Medical Association has no policy for or against abortion. Instead, its formal policy says that TMA “recognizes abortion as a legal medical procedure, and the performance of abortion must be based upon early and accurate diagnosis of pregnancy; informed and nonjudgmental counseling; prompt referral to skillful and understanding personnel working in a good facility; reasonable cost; and professional follow up.”
Last Updated On
September 11, 2018
Originally Published On
September 11, 2018