Nearly 6,000 doctors called on the Supreme Court to protect emergency abortions, urging the Supreme Court to uphold a federal law recently challenged by Idaho.
Nearly 6,000 doctors from across the country wrote one letter on Wednesday asked the country's highest court to uphold protections for patients who experience complications and require emergency abortion care.
“We call on the Supreme Court to uphold guaranteed access to medical care for all patients when they enter an emergency department under the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act (EMTALA),” the medical professionals said in the letter.
“No patient should be denied access to emergency care, including those in need of an abortion. We know firsthand how complications from pregnancy can very quickly lead to a medical crisis, requiring immediate care and treatment.”
The letter, signed by physicians from various specialties, was organized by Committee to Protect Health Care (CTP), a national health care advocacy group with thousands of members working in the field.
CTP's effort comes as the Supreme Court heard the case of US v. Idaho last month.
In that case, the Department of Justice (DOJ) has argued that EMTALA requires hospitals to use Medicare funds to provide emergency treatment to patients, including abortion. Idaho has argued that the state has already set its own standard and that the law makes no mention of abortion.
“In these states, without the protection of this state law, a woman would be denied care in an emergency department even though her organs are incapacitated due to a ruptured placenta,” the doctors said in the letter. “Patients would be turned away from the emergency department because they have an ectopic pregnancy that endangers their lives.”
“These horrific and heartbreaking scenarios are all too real – and can be prevented by allowing physicians and healthcare professionals to practice the full scope of medicine when a patient comes to our emergency department, without political interference or the threat of prosecution.”
