(C) Pennsylvania Capital-Star This story was originally published by Pennsylvania Capital-Star and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . U.S. Supreme Court sends Idaho abortion case back down to lower courts • Pennsylvania Capital-Star [1] ['Kelcie Moseley-Morris', 'Kim Lyons', 'Abigail Hakas', 'Lia Chien', 'More From Author', '- June', '.Wp-Block-Co-Authors-Plus-Coauthors.Is-Layout-Flow', 'Class', 'Wp-Block-Co-Authors-Plus', 'Display Inline'] Date: 2024-06-27 15:38:16+00:00 As expected after the court said it inadvertently uploaded the opinion prematurely on Wednesday, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a decision Thursday remanding a case about emergency abortions in Idaho back to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals for now. The decision was 6-3, with conservative Justices Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch and Clarence Thomas dissenting. It was issued “per curiam,” meaning there is no lead author of the overall opinion. The justices affirming the decision wrote that they determined the court took the case too early in the process. It granted the request to hear the case in January before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals could hold its own hearing on an injunction that blocked enforcement of the law against emergency room physicians who might need to perform an abortion to prevent a pregnant patient from experiencing significant health effects from infection or other conditions. The government argued Idaho could not enforce its criminal abortion ban in emergency rooms because it would violate a federal law known as the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, or EMTALA, which requires Medicare-funded hospitals to treat patients who come to an emergency room regardless of their ability to pay. When justices agreed to hear the case, the court also dropped the injunction, leaving doctors in Idaho open to prosecution under its criminal abortion ban, which carries penalties of jail time, fines and the loss of a medical license. Idaho’s civil law also allows immediate and extended family members to sue the doctors for up to $20,000 over an abortion procedure. Idaho’s ban contains only an exception to save the pregnant patient’s life, not to prevent detrimental health outcomes, including the loss of future fertility, which is a risk with severe infection or bleeding. Without further clarity written into the law, doctors have said they can’t confidently assess when to safely intervene to save someone’s life. Rather than take the chance, high-risk obstetric specialists have airlifted patients to a facility out of state that can freely perform the procedure before it’s too late. In 2023, the state’s largest hospital system said at their facilities such transfers happened once, but occurred six times between January and April, when the injunction was lifted. Justice Amy Coney Barrett, who is typically conservative in her rulings, said the court’s decisions to hear the case and drop the injunction were premised on the belief that Idaho would suffer “irreparable harm” under the injunction and that the cases were ready for the court’s immediate determination. She wrote that the briefings and oral argument in April shed more light on the case, and made it clear that conscience objections were covered under EMTALA and other concerns about an interpretation that would include emergency mental health concerns did not apply. “I am now convinced that these cases are no longer appropriate for early resolution,” Barrett wrote. Dr. Caitlin Gustafson, president of a group of Idaho physicians who have spoken out against the ban and submitted a brief to the court in the case, said the decision is not the end of her coalition’s work. “We are relieved by the Supreme Court’s decision,” Gustafson said. “However, this ruling addresses only a small part of the ever-increasing barriers across the health care landscape. The coalition remains committed to advocating for comprehensive policy updates to fill the gaps in healthcare access created by Idaho’s restrictive laws, which jeopardize patient safety. We will not relent until private healthcare decisions are once again at the discretion of patients and their physicians, free from political interference.” Ahead of the decision, more than 6,000 doctors from around the country also appealed to the court to protect ER physicians, along with medical professionals in Idaho and advocacy organizations. an amicus brief filed in the Supreme Court in this case on behalf of law professors David S. Cohen, Greer Donley, and Rachel Rebouché. “While we’re relieved the anti-abortion movement failed in their goal of enabling states to directly criminalize emergency care for pregnant people required by federal law, we need an answer,” said Women’s Law Project Co-Executive Director and Legal Director Susan J. Frietsche. She authoredfiled in the Supreme Court in this case on behalf of law professors David S. Cohen, Greer Donley, and Rachel Rebouché. “People are being denied their rights in cruel, life-endangering ways. It’s grotesque that it’s even a question, but we need and deserve the Court to clarify the rights of pregnant people to obtain emergency medical care,” Frietsche added. The case now returns to the Ninth Circuit to resume the process, but it could ultimately return to the Supreme Court at a later date. The Capital-Star contributed reporting. [END] --- [1] Url: https://penncapital-star.com/abortion-policy/u-s-supreme-court-sends-idaho-abortion-case-back-down-to-lower-courts/ Published and (C) by Pennsylvania Capital-Star Content appears here under this condition or license: Creative Commons CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/penncapitalstar/