Trend Alert? Federal Judges Halt Texas and Louisiana Abortion Restrictions

ann harkness/Flickr

Over the long weekend, federal district judges in both Texas and Louisiana moved to halt new abortion clinic restrictions from taking effect. In both instances the laws were slated to become active on Monday, September 1.

Louisiana's requirement, signed into law in June, requires all abortion-clinic doctors to have admitting privileges at local hospitals. On Sunday, U.S. District Judge John deGravelles granted doctors a temporary reprieve from repercussions for continuing to practice while they seek these privileges, a process that can take several months.

On Friday, U.S. District Judge Lee Yeakel threw out a Texas provision which would have forced 12 of the state's 19 abortion clinics to close. The provision is part of a broader abortion law which also requires clinic doctors to have admitting privileges at local hospitals. That part of the law was upheld by the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals earlier this year.

But in general TRAP ("targeted regulation of abortion providers") laws haven't fared so well in the Southern states lately. In early August, a federal district judge ordered Alabama legislators to reconsider a requirement that abortion-clinic doctors have hospital admitting privileges. And in July, the notoriously-conservative 5th Circuit Court ruled that Mississippi's admitting-privileges law—which would have forced the state's one remaining abortion clinic to close—was unconstitutional.

Comments

[Carl ?s his ? for ?s]

Don't teach ENB how not to write abortion articles. Teach commenters not to flame her.

[Warty]

The further ENB gets from being a white man, the more culturally acceptable it is to violate her privacy.

[John]

Is this your way of saying you hacked her Icloud account this weekend?

[Nikki, Vilely Bred]

Yes.

[John]

I thought so. Does Warty prefer to leak his photos on 4chan or Reddit?

[Almanian!]

Yes

[Idle Hands]

Is it okay to flame if I ask first? Does no really mean no? Is affirmative consent needed before said flaming? These are the questions that need answering.

[John]

If these regulations are just a sham designed to shut down abortion clinics by other means, then yeah, they should be struck down. There is, however, a large elephant in the room by the name of Kermit Gosnell. The state does have a legitimate interest in ensuring clinics are properly run and that monsters like Gosnell go undetected. This is a bit difficult to do when every regulation of an abortion clinic is considered a "restriction".

[Bo Cara Esq.]

The thing is, these laws make it tougher to do that by making regulations synonymous with attempts to shut down the provider. When you've got laws that really aim to treat abortion providers differently than equivalent services being sold in the name of stopping future Gosnells that discredits any real attempts to do so.

[JWW]

Bullshit! This is purely special favors by the state.

If a teenage girl want to get an abortion, the state and the courts will clear the way of her to go to an abortion clinic that has as few regulations as possible, and God forbid her parents be notified!

If, however a teenage girl has an appendicitis and is taken to the doctor, the doctor damn well better have admitting privileges to the hospital, however, that doctor won't proceed at all without the full approval and validation of health care coverage and go ahead from the girl's parents.

Abortion: the only economic activity that the progressives believe requires NO REGULATION AT ALL.

Shit, farmers are facing huge threats by the EPA regulating all water on any land and the damn progressives aren't lifting a finger to save THEM from regulation.

Progressive = Hypocrite

I'll give a shit about them complaining about regulations when they acknowledge that there is an industry, ANY industry, outside of the abortion industry that is also affected by them.

The judicial branches hypocrisy here is compelling too. When the damn EPA comes looking for things to regulate they are literally given the ability to regulate anything the air, but when a doctor performing an invasive procedure is expected to have the ability to admit any patient with complications to a hospital OMG!!!! Regulation run amok.

I am completely outraged at this fucking double standard!

[Bo Cara Esq.]

You've got it in reverse, this law would subject abortion providers to different, stricter standards than providers of other 'invasive procedures' like colonoscopy. That's why the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists took out a full page ad in Texas newspapers criticizing it.

http://www.acog.org/About_ACOG.....egislators

[JWW]

Colonoscopy is a far less complicated procedure than abortion.

[Agammamon]

Well, actually its not.

[Root Boy]

Is ACOG just like the AMA - in other words captured by leftists and run by a small cadre with little input from the rank and file?

[Mencken Sense]

"Abortion: the only economic activity that the progressives believe requires NO REGULATION AT ALL."

But what if an abortion clinic refused service to a lesbian...?

HEAD ASPLODE

[Agammamon]

Its a 'boy who cried wolf' lesson for legislatures.

The more politicians make hue and cry about 'we need a law' in response to an incident, and then go on to make laws that have nothing to do with that incident, the more people will distrust their motives with *any* law.

Admitting privileges would have had no effect on Gosnell's actions.

[John]

Perhaps not. If so, then shame on them. But I can't tell from ENB's article why that is the case. The post would be better if she would explain why the requirement is a shame rather than just assuming that since it was passed by a Southern Legislature and concerned abortion, it must be.

[Agammamon]

I'd say, given the legislature's history (doesn't matter which one, they all do this) they don't get the benefit of the doubt.

Assume that the legislation (any legislation) is to benefit a particular voting segment/crony and let the legislature provide suitable justification for why its neutral.

[John]

See Meglo Monicles post below. It would seem that the issue isn't as simple as ENB makes it sound.

[MegaloMonocle]

Admitting privileges would have had no effect on Gosnell's actions.

If he had to have admitting privileges to run his practice, then I think he would have been shut down. The list of known prior complaints at Wiki would have blackballed him from most if not all hospital medical staffs.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kermit_Gosnell

[Agammamon]

Assuming that he acted to admit those patients. And didn't do exactly what he did anyway.

[WDATPDIM?!]

IAYM "that monsters like Gosnell not go undetected."

[Warty]

The gun crowd has absolutely no trust left for any gun control bill because all recent gun laws have been intended to be steps towards gun bans. The abortion crowd has the exact same opinion of any abortion bill. And who can blame them?

[John]

The only difference is that the anti abortion people are honest and admit their goal is to ban abortion. The gun control people are a bit more devious and try and pretend they just want a reasonable compromise.

[Agammamon]

That doesn't mean the *legislature*, in an attempt to curry favor with one side while avoiding alienating the other, won't try to slide in highly biased legislation.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

The fact is that public opinion is in the "muddled moderate" territory. Taking polls literally, most of the public would ban most abortions, leaving legal abortions for rare cases like rape.

This is the political reality which prolifers like yours truly try to "exploit." There just isn't majority support for "elective" (non-rape, non-fetal deformity, non-physical-health-threatening) abortions, which are most of the abortions performed today.

The problem, from our point of view, is that the muddled moderates won't confront the abortion issue on their own, the prolifers have to push them. But once we can get a vote, then yes, we can get the moderates' reluctant support for restricting the crazier elements of abortion.

I take the choicers at their word that restricting the crazier elements of abortion threatens the "core" abortion right. So be it!

[Agammamon]

Of course, 'muddled moderates' like me simply don't trust you. Well, not *you* personally.

I'm sure *you* would stop once abortion was made illegal except in cases of rape, etc. I could support a compromise like that.

The problem comes in that there are tons of others in your camp that won't. Each compromise in their favor is seen solely as a single step towards their preferred future, not as a 'compromise'.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

"Of course, 'muddled moderates' like me simply don't trust you."

And why would you? He just himself said "a key secondary consideration is - maybe the "abortion crowd" is right and *any* restriction can be a precedent for further restriction. If so, that would be excellent."

[Notorious G.K.C.]

Oh, I'm an admitted extremist. I would like to ban abortion even of children whose fathers are criminals (such as rapists).

Here's the problem, from my point of view: If I think the abortions laws aren't prolife enought, unlike my opponents I can't run to the federal courts and get them to tighten protections for the unborn. Even the "extreme right-wing" Justice Scalia won't do that for me - all he will do is *allow* the states to ban abortion, he won't *require* that they do so.

Thus, my only choice is to turn to the likes of you, the muddled moderate. You basically have a veto on how far you want restriction on abortion to go. If you want women to be able to execute their unborn children for the sins of their fathers, you will be able to have your preference respected in the law, despite my protests.

Simply as a matter of political reality, the fact is that you control the situation - you get to decide how far you'll let us go in regulating abortion.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

"Simply as a matter of political reality, the fact is that you control the situation - you get to decide how far you'll let us go in regulating abortion."

That's it, in a nutshell. People like Eddie want to end it altogether, no exceptions for rape or incest, no exceptions for women in terminal vegetative states, no exception for a one day old microscopic embryo. Heck, I imagine no exception for things which *might be said* to cause an abortion (the contraceptive at issue in Hobby Lobby and cited, hilariously, here today by MM). He's hoping people with far less extreme views than his will go along on less extreme restrictions, which he upfront acknowledges he hopes will be used for precedent and building blocks to reach his extreme views.

[kbolino]

That's pretty much what he said, so I don't understand why you rephrased it as some sort of accusation.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Maybe analogize to gun rights and extremists on gun control and you might see.

[kbolino]

It's a good thing you're here to spoonfeed ideas to me.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Glad to be of help.

[Agammamon]

And, as for me, we're there already simply because its damn difficult to untighten the 'regulation ratchet'.

OTOH - I'm perfectly cool with this being done on a state by state basis.

Despite people trying to portray is otherwise, 'pro-life' is not a simple ethical position.

Of course, then you run into the problem of someone crossing state borders for an abortion potentially being arrested and held for endangering a child or violating medical advice.

[Tony]

Thank god we have John to read their minds.

[kbolino]

If GKC is an exemplar of the former and you of the latter, then it didn't really take any mind-reading to reach that conclusion.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

If I accepted their premises, I wouldn't blame them at all. They want abortions legal - they don't want "access" limited, even in the name of women's health. Any restriction whatsoever, they believe, will set a precedent which threatens their whole house of cards.
'
While my primary reason for supporting prolife laws is that they protect babies, a key secondary consideration is - maybe the "abortion crowd" is right and *any* restriction can be a precedent for further restriction. If so, that would be excellent.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

"They want abortions legal - they don't want "access" limited, even in the name of women's health."

If that were the case pro-choice groups would be out there selling DIY abortions. They're willing to limit access in the name of health regulations (these people rarely dislike regulation per se), they just oppose sham regulations which really just aim to close down clinics.

[MegaloMonocle]

If that were the case pro-choice groups would be out there selling DIY abortions.

You mean, like this?

http://www.plannedparenthood.o.....traception

[Bo Cara Esq.]

I'm glad to know you consider IUD, Ella and OneStep to be abortions Megalo, it helps me know where you're coming from with your other claims.

[MegaloMonocle]

Pill abortions are widely regarded as "medical abortions", as opposed to "surgical abortions", Bo.

http://www.prochoice.org/about.....rtion.html

And here's more Planned Parenthood peddling of do-it-yourself medical abortions. This one is for a different drug than is in the Plan B pills labeled as "emergency contraception", but the mechanism for terminating pregnancy is pretty much the same. If you want to hang your hat on the marketing wrap for Plan B being "emergency contraception" rather than a medical abortion, go right ahead.

http://www.earlyoptionpill.com.....t_mifeprex

Many Planned Parenthood health centers also offer Mifeprex for early pregnancy termination.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

You're changing your goalposts because your first attempt was so silly.

[MegaloMonocle]

So, you're going to hang your hat on the marketing campaign for Plan B as emergency contraception, rather than a medical abortion.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Yes, I'm the kind of nut who thinks that a drug that 'may inhibit implantation' is not abortion in any meaningful sense.

[kbolino]

a drug that 'may inhibit implantation'

That is not an accurate description of Mifeprex. In small doses, it prevents ovulation, but in larger doses, it is undeniably an abortifacient.

Taking it more than a day or so after sex is going to guarantee that it is either ineffective (in small doses) or intended to terminate an established pregnancy (in large doses).

[MegaloMonocle]

That's exactly what RU-486/Mifeprex does, you knob. It prevents implantation, just like Plan B does.

Yet one is an "abortion pill" and the other is "emergency contraception".

Both are medical abortions. Why someone who sees nothing wrong with early-term abortions is so resistant to this terminology is a mystery to me.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

MM, you may be a lawyer at a hospital and deserve deference about that kind of thing, but you're just going against the scientific grain when you claim Plan B is abortion. Like I said, some religious people think that (like the Hobby Lobby owners), but it's widely not accepted (of course, that does nothing to negate their RFRA claim).

http://ec.princeton.edu/questions/ecabt.html

[Notorious G.K.C.]

Or to put it another way, they oppose any regulations which the clinics they operate would have trouble complying with.

Like the requirement that hallways be able to accomodate a gurney:

http://www.lcrtl.org/blog/2012/06/16/1028/

[Bo Cara Esq.]

You mean two gurneys at the same time, and other such non-applicable regulations targeting abortion providers that don't apply to providers of equivalent (in fact, more likely to have complications) in-patient surgery procedures?

[Notorious G.K.C.]

No, try to keep up.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

It's hard to 'keep up' with dishonesty.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

Projection - it isn't just for movie theaters any more!

[Bo Cara Esq.]

This hackneyed line has more sequels than Die Hard.

[Agammamon]

TRAP laws haven't fared so well in the Southern states lately.

See, this is why you can't give one inch on social issues.

I mean look what happened when we toned down the stigma associated with homosexuality. Now Mormons think its OK to live simultaneously in a spouse-like relationship with more than one person.

We've not got too much further to go before total societal collapse.

[BilboTeabaggins]

Another abortion thread? How about discussing actual events that matter, like The Fappening?

[John]

I am pretty disappointed in Reason that there wasn't a ton of links to the offending pictures on the morning links thread.

What happened to the Reason I used to know?

[Idle Hands]

I blame all these Millennial Libertarians that have started to crash these boards.

[paranoid android]

I guess all the potential commenters on that topic found trying to type with one hand too difficult.

[Anonymous Coward]

The Fappening? That's what the Reddit mouthbreathers are calling it. Either way, Jennifer Lawrence looks fantastic naked.

Lessons learned:

1. Don't create nude images of yourself.
2. Don't upload nude images of yourself to a third-party server or worse, multiple serves (hi cloud storage).
3. Never trust Apple.

[Dances-with-Trolls]

My Twitter feed has taught me that these are the opinions of a Patriarchal Rape Culture Enabler.

[Anonymous Coward]

"The women weren't so bad, though it was worth your life to look at the wrong one the wrong way. I knew a man, Scarb, this Oznak cut his liver out. Claimed to be defending a lady's honor, he did, said Scarb had raped her with his eyes. How do you rape a wench with eyes, I ask you? But his uncle is the richest man in Meereen and his father commands the city guard, so I had to run like a rat before he killed me too."

[John]

Yes she does. If it turns out that as some of the women are saying some these photos had been deleted, then I think Apple ought to have to pay through the nose for this.

I totally understand that there are security risks and if I store something on the cloud and it gets hacked, that comes with using the service. But my assumption of the risk should not include the risk of anything I put on the Apple server remaining there forever even if I delete it. That is bullshit. Apple owes me deleting my information when I tell them to, even if they don't owe me perfect security.

And I would add another party at fault in this; the actresses management. Kate Upton gets paid to run around in a bikini. Jennifer Lawrance gets paid to do whatever it is she does. But neither of them are necessarily tech savy or understand the risks of the cloud. But all of them pay talent management to be savvy. If their management dind't make it clear not to put anything on the cloud they didn't want released, they really let their clients down.

[Agammamon]

Yah, except - read your TOS.

Most likely it basically says that Apple owns a copy of anything they host.

Facebook's does.

[Gluesponge]

Encrypt it before it hits the cloud and they can own a pile of bits. 🙂

I'm not saying that Jennifer Lawrence should get iCrypt (or whatever the iPhone equivalent is), but I do think she should go through her phone settings and make sure "photos automatically uploaded to iCloud" is unchecked (if that's even possible, come to think of it.)

[perlhaqr]

Or unless it was "still in the trash can" or whatever.

[Anonymous Coward]

Even if they were deleted, the company (in this case, Apple) would be in trouble if they didn't retain the images. Several laws (including the FRCP) require businesses to preserve their "electronic business communications," of which the nudes may fall into that category. And if Apple showed that they retained them in spite of their customer's desire to delete them for the purpose of complying with statutory or regulatory requirements, or in light of pending or future litigation, then any of the thoughtless starlets might be up a legal creek without a paddle against Apple.

I don't have a good BS yarn to spin for managers and agents, but I'm sure it falls under some principle of agency law.

[John]

Yes, if there is a law that requires that, you are correct. That is a good point. And now that you say it, I bet there are laws that say just that. It is better to place the privacy of everyone who uses the internet at risk than to allow one person to delete any child porn or pirated movies ahead of the feds after all.

It goes back to "never put anything on anyone else' server that you don't want made public" rule. But Lawrance and Upton get paid for their tits not their brains. Their management really let them down here I think at least.

And if ever there was a case for DOJ to use anti-trust law to go after someone, it is the tech companies over their TOSes. They all have the same outrageous conditions. And I have no doubt they all collude to ensure no one offers a better alternative.

[kbolino]

And I have no doubt they all collude to ensure no one offers a better alternative.

While this is true to some extent, the collusion is pushed by the government in the first place. Try to run a hosting service with different TOS, like Lavabit, and eventually you'll get an NSL and either have to violate your own terms or else shut down.

[Raston Bot]

it's the male gaze version of the rapture event in The Leftovers*, except it's much more than 2% of the population that disappears.

*never seen an episode

[John]

I think I saw a trailer for a big budget Hollywood movie based on the Rapture a couple of weeks ago.

[Raston Bot]

Left Behind with Nicolas Cage.

Actually, that's Left Behind starring Nicolas Cage. "Left Behind with Nicolas Cage" would be a snuff film.

[MegaloMonocle]

while they seek these privileges, a process that can take several months

I've worked in hospitals for years and years, and a complete application takes a few weeks to process. The delay comes when the docs don't submit all the info we need.

These docs have all had plenty of time to get their applications in and reviewed. As a basis for suspending the new law, this is dubious at best.

Abortion clinics live right on the fringes of regulation, providing "ambulatory surgery" procedures in doctor's offices. Doctor's offices are generally unregulated, while ambulatory surgery centers are regulated. Given that we have seen how badly wrong things can go in unregulated doctor's offices with large abortion practices, this isn't the worst abuse of regulation I have seen, by a long shot.

What sticks in my craw is the special privilege that abortion doctors get. These cases are a good example of it.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

"The delay comes when the docs don't submit all the info we need."

Or when pro-life groups protest the hospital to get them not to admit abortion providing doctors, eh?

I don't think any medical, as opposed to political (I know, I know, lots of overlap there) has suggested these regulations are necessary.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

Hmmm...I guess a certain stigma has crept into abortion among mainstream, normal doctors, kind of like the stigma against assisting at executions...and, by the way, the anti-death-penalty people press hard on this angle, trying to restrict executions by restricting medical personnel from involvement.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

There's been some well covered cases of pro-life groups protesting and threatening further disruption of hospital business if they allow abortion providers admitting procedures.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

You mean picketing outside the hospital? I've done that, and I'm certainly not ashamed of it - if abortionists can't deal with the First Amendment, too bad for them.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

You would have loved my sign - it was a painting as large as me showing Christ with an unborn child in His hand.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

That's pretty sick.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

Projection isn't just for movie theaters any more.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Apparently its for life sized placards.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

Wow, that insult must have been really advanced, since it went right over my head!

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Like anything else I guess. When your eyes are on the goal of averting the Tiny Person Holocaust, everything else get's barely a passing glance.

[JWW]

Maybe its because all doctors take an oath to "First, do no harm", and they know that the abortion doctors were lying when they took that oath.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Maybe the doctors thought that the harms to women of unplanned pregnancies outweighed the 'harms' of aborting microscopic cells?

[Agammamon]

All doctor's are lying when they take that oath.

Radiotherapy
Chemotherapy
Drug side-effects
Surgery

Doing harm is often a requirement. They simply try to do more good than harm so that the patient ends up cured.

[JWW]

Yes, I agree that's the intent of the oath.

However, the ones I'm talking about being harmed here aren't the women.

[Dances-with-Trolls]

Lolwut?

Physicians performing office-based surgery must have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital, a transfer agreement with another physician who has admitting privileges at a nearby hospital, or maintain an emergency transfer agreement with a nearby hospital.

[Dances-with-Trolls]

The following groups all signed off on this regulation:

Accreditation Association for Ambulatory Health Care, American Academy of Cosmetic Surgery, American Academy of Dermatology, American Academy of Facial Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, American Academy of Ophthalmology, American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons, American Academy of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery, American Academy of Pediatrics, American Association for Accreditation of Ambulatory Surgery Facilities, American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, American College of Surgeons, American Medical Association, American Osteopathic Association, American Society for Dermatologic Surgery, American Society for Reproductive Medicine, American Society of Anesthesiologists, American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery, American Society of General Surgeons, American Society of Plastic Surgeons, American Urological Association, Federation of State Medical Boards, Indiana State Medical Society, Institute for Medical Quality-California Medical Association, Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations, Kansas Medical Society, Massachusetts Medical Society, Medical Association of the State of Alabama, Medical Society of the State of New York, Missouri State Medical Association, National Committee for Quality Assurance, Pennsylvania Medical Society, and Society of Interventional Radiology.

You can argue against their position (I do, to a degree) but don't say it doesn't exist.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

It's not quite that simple (for one thing these laws apply to offices that perform medication abortions)

[Dances-with-Trolls]

You just can't help yourself, can you?

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Those wouldn't be 'office based surgeries' genius.

[Dances-with-Trolls]

Nope, you can't.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

When you swim laps in your own smug, snark, what stroke do you use? I'm guessing dog paddle.

[Dances-with-Trolls]

And, just to be clear my response to this: I don't think any medical, as opposed to political (I know, I know, lots of overlap there) has suggested these regulations are necessary.

Listing numerous mainstream medical organizations that are in favor of doctors that do invasive surgical procedures have admitting privileges became this:

It's not quite that simple (for one thing these laws apply to offices that perform medication abortions)

I hope you didn't throw your back out when you moved those goalposts.

I'm pro-choice Bo and I have a number of concerns about regulatory attack on abortion clinincs. What is not helpful is when pro-choice supporters make totally false or dishonest claims that are easily discredited.

The idea that the doctors in these clinics should have admitting privileges is not some SoCon plot, but mainstream medical thinking. There are other regulations that are petty, harmful, etc with a lot more diversity of opinion, but on the admitting issue it's fairly united.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Of course I meant 'these regulations are necessary for abortion providers.' Has any medical body argued for their adoption for abortion providers?

And its not goal moving to note that regulations requiring medication abortions are not supported by a position on surgery providers, no matter how many people adopted it (in relation to surgery).

[Dances-with-Trolls]

For invasive surgical procedures, of which abortions are one, and which complications from can sometimes require emergency medical care. So, yes.

As for medication abortion, then you are drifting into anti-abortion territory. I haven't polled the AMA but the doctors that I know do not consider medication abortion to be abortion at all. If a clinic is only doing medication abortion then they are not doing invasive surgery and do not fall under the position that I outlined.

[Almanian!]

PWND

[Agammamon]

Well, that's an easy fix.

The legislature can simply pull out the metrics showing the significantly higher rate of complications requiring hospitalization when compared to other office practices.

*If* that's the case then the data would support this requirement.

If there is no data (or the data do not show such a difference) then this is just another of the sort of regulation that we as *libertarians* oppose in other parts of life.

Lets not let our personal biases (against *and* for) about abortion provision blind us to this.

If a regulation is needed, there'll be data showing that need. If that data isn't there, then forget about it.

[MegaloMonocle]

The legislature can simply pull out the metrics showing the significantly higher rate of complications requiring hospitalization when compared to other office practices.

I'd be all for that, if they performed the same exercise for ambulatory surgical centers.

The fly in the ointment is that the data for abortions will be crap. When an abortion clinic sends a patient to a hospital, it is not unheard of for it to be labelled a "miscarriage" or "complications of pregnancy".

[Agammamon]

Well, I thought my premise that this should be done for *all regulations*, in *all aspects of life*, without bias for or against, would show through.

[HazelMeade]

Exactly. Let us thus establish a most excellent precedent whereby regulations need to be jusutified before a court of law using sound statistical data about the real risks.

That would be fucking awesome.

[MegaloMonocle]

Yes, it would. Unfortunately, the precedent here will be that abortion regulations need to be justified, etc.

[perlhaqr]

Abortion clinics live right on the fringes of regulation, providing "ambulatory surgery" procedures in doctor's offices. Doctor's offices are generally unregulated, while ambulatory surgery centers are regulated.

If that's the case, and if the correct answer is to impose more regulation, then the correct thing to do would seem to be to regulate abortion clinics as the ambulatory surgery centers that they are.

Hire some actual medical professionals to come up with a set of requirements for facilities that perform surgeries of similar invasiveness as an abortion, and regulate all ambulatory surgical centers that perform procedures of that complexity or less the same, possibly with a lower quantum of regulation if there's a logical lower step, or a logical higher step.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

This is what the abortion providers have asked for, also a bill was introduced in Congress to that effect, that any state regulation on abortion providers must apply as well to equivalent medical providers. The pro-life crowd objected it and it went nowhere. They're singling them out, that's the point.

[kbolino]

The pro-life crowd objected [to] it

Cite?

[Bo Cara Esq.]

http://www.latimes.com/local/a.....tml#page=1

[kbolino]

Except that the bill in question does more than just that:

"Makes the following other restrictions on the performance of abortion unlawful and prohibits their imposition or application by any government:

- a prohibition or ban prior to fetal viability;
- a prohibition after fetal viability when, in the good-faith medical judgment of the treating physician, continuation of the pregnancy would pose a risk to the woman's life or health;
- a restriction that limits a woman's ability to obtain an immediate abortion when a health care professional believes, based on good-faith medical judgment, that delay would pose a risk to the woman's health; and
- a prohibition or restriction on obtaining an abortion prior to fetal viability based on a woman's reasons or perceived reasons or that requires her to state her reasons before obtaining an abortion prior to fetal viability."

S.1696 - Women's Health Protection Act of 2013

Also, the crux of the objection hinges on "medically comparable procedures" being ambiguous (indeed the bill does not define the term) and the "liberal construction" section of the bill, which basically tells the courts to interpret "medically comparable procedures" as broadly as necessary to maintain access to abortion as a "right".

Testimony of Carol Tobias, President NRLC

[Bo Cara Esq.]

That's all very nice, but Tobias is quoted in the article herself as basically rooting her opposition in 'oh, nothing is comparable to abortion, because BABY KILLING!'

Think about it, if the law requires other comparable providers to be covered like abortion providers, and Tobias and you are putting these regulations forward because you really are concerned about the patient's health, you think they really are necessary for that, then why oppose these regulations providing to other providers, even liberally construed? It's just that you want to single out abortion, and that's evident from her quote.

[kbolino]

I did not say I supported or opposed the bill, only that you mischaracterized it. By her words, Carol Tobias would likely oppose a bill that solely limited restrictions on abortion providers, but that was not the bill at hand.

I don't believe abortion is a matter for the Federal government to decide one way or the other, but the 14th Amendment and Roe v. Wade (et al.) muddy that water quite a bit.

[MegaloMonocle]

Or when pro-life groups protest the hospital to get them not to admit abortion providing doctors, eh?

Which, of course, has nothing to do with the rather misleading factual assertion that it takes months and months for hospitals to process an application for privileges.

Try to stay on point, Bo. Your legal career will benefit if you do.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Are you talking how long it takes them in theory or in practice? Hospitals that don't want a lobby full of placard waving protesters might move a little slower on them than they possibly could.

[MegaloMonocle]

I'm talking about in practice, and how the factual assertion is unqualified by either (a) physician inability to complete the application and (b) the likelihood of protests.

My recollection is that the protests were over pending applications, in which case the way to make them stop isn't to delay the application, its to act on it.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Hospitals can be in a bind in those situations. Denying makes one group mad, granting makes another. Bureaucracies tend to dither in those situations.

[Invisible Finger]

IT seems like Step 2 of the legislative angle is going to be "Great, now that you have admission privileges, the procedure MUST be performed at a hospital." And of course the cost goes up, the hospital becomes a target for lawsuits, etc. so few if any hospitals will allow abortions to take place on their premises. And then the hospitals can be blamed for not allowing abortions rather than the legislature.

[MegaloMonocle]

Admitting privileges would have had no effect on Gosnell's actions.

If he had to have admitting privileges to run his practice, then I think he would have been shut down. The list of known prior complaints at Wiki would have blackballed him from most if not all hospital medical staffs.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kermit_Gosnell

[tarran]

If he had to have admitting privileges to run his practice, then I think he would have been shut down. The list of known prior complaints at Wiki would have blackballed him from most if not all hospital medical staffs.

I'm curious as to how that would have worked. The first complaints about unlicensed staff seem administrative. The one about improperly storing and accounting for children's vaccines is for me the first red flag. That happened in 2001, well after the first complaints to regulators about his shoddy practises (1996)

With your more knowledgeable judgment, how do you think he would have been tripped up?

[MegaloMonocle]

Part of your application has to include disclosure of those sorts of complaints, and you have to either immediately report any complaints after you are admitted to the medical staff, or disclose them every couple of years when your medical staff membership is renewed.

[John]

I am pretty sure this

Part of your application has to include disclosure of those sorts of complaints, and you have to either immediately report any complaints after you are admitted to the medical staff, or disclose them every couple of years when your medical staff membership is renewed.

goes a long way towards explaining this

These docs have all had plenty of time to get their applications in and reviewed (yet don't seem to have them)

[tarran]

Again, though, how does this work?

It seems to me the only complaints he has to report are the ones that are made by the regulators, and as in the Rotherham child abuse ring, the regulators didn't *want* to delve into the complaints.

I imagine most good doctors who run ambulatory surgery centers have complaints against them fairly regularly (judging from the idiot customer complaints that cross my desk, like threats to sue us because Macchu Picchu is not wheelchair accessible), so how does the hospital decide which complaints matter and which don't?

[John]

so how does the hospital decide which complaints matter and which don't?

By investigating it and using their professional judgement?

Are you being intentionally obtuse here or are you really this dense? Is this an immigration thread or something? Hospitals have to hire doctors don't they? How is this any different? You don't want incompetent doctors working for you anymore than you want them treating and admitting patients there.

This isn't an immigration thread.

[tarran]

John, when a lawyer asks basic questions in a deposition, is he being obtuse? Or is he trying to find out how things actually happen?

I don't work in the medical industry. Megalo does. I am asking him how it would actually work citing the points of failure that I *expect* would prevent things from actually working the way he says they do.

Hopefully, this will elicit a more detailed response, so that I will be enlightened.

It amuses me that on one hand you bitch that people who disagree with you are ignorant, and then bitch at them when they try to educate themselves.

[John]

It is pretty clear that one of the basic essential skills of running a hospital is ensuring that the doctors who operate in your hospital are not dangerously incompetent. Your insurance company is going to insist on it. So, I fail to see how "but how would they be able to tell the real complaints from the BS ones?" is anything but a grade A stupid question.

[tarran]

No John, my question wasn't how would they be *able* to tell the real complaints from the BS ones, it was how *do* they do it. Because I was curious how it's actually done.

And you'll not Megalo actually answered it instead of saying "it's a stupid question, fuck off".

[Swiss Servator, Bern baby Bern]

It appears he reaches that point with all of us idiots, sooner or later, tarran. Its a wonder we can feed ourselves and get dressed in the morning, much less make it to work or perform any other high level activities.

[MegaloMonocle]

I imagine most good doctors who run ambulatory surgery centers have complaints against them fairly regularly

Actually, no. Most doctors do not have these kinds of complaints, and even fewer have the complaints substantiated and action taken against them (like happened with Gosnell).

You are correct that unsubstantiated patient complaints are generally not reportable as part of your medical staff membership.

However, substantiated complaints that implicate quality of care (like those against Gosnell) are pretty much impossible to overcome at any decent hospital.

With that rap sheet, Gosnell wasn't getting onto any decent hospital unless they did so for political/ideological reasons, just to allow him to run his clinic.

[tarran]

I don't see this being as effective as you think it would be:

1) Gosnell was well regarded by the political machine of Philadelphia

2) The regulators as a result pretty much shitcanned every complaint about him, and it looks like they would have kept doing it forever if not for...

3) The DEA decided to go after him, not for substandard care, but because prescribed too many opiates. (Of course his manner of prescribing pills willy nilly *was* substandard care - how the hell do you not keep track of what you've given to whom?)

It seems to me that admitting privileges would likely not have been a hurdle for Gosnell. The same political pressure that was prompted state regulators to sweep his misdeeds under the rug would likely have led one hospital in PA to ignore the few complaints that were substantiated.

My guess is that absent the DEA going after him for giving out pain pills, he would still be doing his butchery for a while.

[Dances-with-Trolls]

It's our very own Rotherham.

[Agammamon]

A question I have

If reporting deficiencies (deficiencies marked down from the regulating agency/ies) would have alerted the hospital that he would have had admitting privileges to would have caused that hospital to what?

Either refuse to renew/revoke his admitting privileges (shutting him down) or reporting him to the very regulators that had already dinged him.

He was already being inspected, why couldn't the inspecting agency halt him? Why would he need to be attached to a hospital so *they* could halt him by revoking his admitting privilege?

I am literally seeing no way this legislation does anything that the regulating agency doesn't already do regarding patient safety/approved practice.

[kbolino]

I am literally seeing no way this legislation does anything that the regulating agency doesn't already do regarding patient safety/approved practice.

Sadly, the hospital faces greater scrutiny from the public than the regulators do. If regulators fail at their jobs, it's because they didn't have enough power or money. But if a hospital fails at its job, it's a clarion call for reform of the system.

It's all a game, as far as I can see, and each side is trying to play it more deftly than the other.

[tarran]

I am literally seeing no way this legislation does anything that the regulating agency doesn't already do regarding patient safety/approved practice.

Very succinctly put.

This is exactly my concern.

[Almanian!]

Abortion - CHECK.

Can I get some deep-dish, ghey, artisanal, Mexican circumcision up in here now?

Shanks.

[Root Boy]

You trying to add slapfights on penis hood removals to this slapfight on abortion -- that will never end?

[SugarFree]

So many pleasingly blank spaces on this thread.

[John]

If there is not a Jezebelle post on this, there should be.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/hea.....ystem.html

I really think radical feminists exist to entertain us.

[SugarFree]

They did one. It's all the fault of men somehow. What a surprising twist.

[HazelMeade]

I hope this survives because it owuld be an AWESOME precedent for getting rid of targeted regulation of other industries. For instance GMOs, nuclear power, fracking, etc.

If liberals can object to these regulations on abortion clinics on the grounds that they unfairly target abortion providers with unnecesarily burdensome regulations, then surely any other economics sector can raise the same complaints about the regulations they are forced to work with. Especially when so many of those regulations are intentionally designed to harass unpopular businesses out of existence.

[John]

Please tell me you are trolling Hazel. You don't actually think they would apply this anywhere else do you?

[HazelMeade]

It's an excellent "be careful what you wish for" lesson for liberals.

And there is no reason that we can't use this case as precedent, and give liberal justices a hard time explaining why it should apply to abortion but not fracking.

[MegaloMonocle]

And there is no reason that we can't use this case as precedent,

Just like all those other cases striking down abortion laws have become precedent for general application?

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Some judges have invoked them in striking down gun control laws burdening, for example, the sale or exercise of weapons training.

[Dances-with-Trolls]

and give liberal justices a hard time explaining why it should apply to abortion but not fracking

I don't think they will strain themselves explaining FTYW.

[Swiss Servator, Bern baby Bern]

D-w-T understands appellate law quite well. FYTW trumps all.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Sadly, the willingness of the courts to get involved here is that in addition to the usual deferential rational basis test for regulatory legislation there is also the undue-burden test for abortion since it is seen as involving a fundamental right. The right to make a living by trading with other voluntary adults is, unfortunately, not so recognized right now.

But I do think this represents an opportunity to change a few minds of pro-choicers who might be boosters of regulation in other areas. Not many, but maybe some.

[Agammamon]

It *is* a sad commentary on the state of our government that you can get an abortion on demand, but need a license to do just about anything else.

[kbolino]

It is a sadder commentary, to me, that people have spent so much time fighting to remove restrictions on abortion, which is at the least a procedure whose necessity you can largely avoid by not getting pregnant, while ignoring or even championing restrictions on other aspects of people's lives.

Of course, it is also a sad commentary that many people would more willingly fight for greater abortion restrictions, which according to their own beliefs will always be punished through eternal damnation, than to fight for freedom in other aspects of people's lives.

A pox on both their houses.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

Just to be clear, so far as I can summarize the views of Christian prolifers (and there *are* non-Christian prolifers, like Nat Hentoff), we would like abortionists to go to Heaven, they just have to be willing to go.

St. Paul helped stone a human being (St. Stephen) to death, but he became a great saint and an apostle to the Gentiles. Dr. Bernard Nathanson aborted numerous children, including one of his own, and helped legalize abortion, but he changed his mind and became a vehement prolife Catholic.

And even those who didn't make such dramatic changes can still be saved. Who can set bounds to the Lord's forgiveness? Only the truly impenitent sinner can do this, and the Lord will be working on all of them to come back to Him.

We can't even preclude the possibility that [Godwin edit] repented at the last moment (though to Catholics, even if he were saved, he'd have to spend a bit of time in Purgatory).

[kbolino]

The state has one weapon, force, and two remedies, cages and death (others exist, but are not common in our time and place). You can drive "legal" abortion providers out of business, but there will still be abortions performed, and abortionists unsaved by the grace of God.

The laws of man can only affect worldly ends. You may find justice for the unborn to be the noblest of mortal causes, but I do not. I certainly don't wish death to any child, born or otherwise, but it is not my hand that carries out the deed. The power of others over me in this life concerns me greater than any moral (or immoral) crusade.

[Gluesponge]

I've always said that if most of the "common sense" gun laws were applied to abortions or some other hot-button progressive issue, there'd be rioting in the streets.

If I have to ask permission, it's not a right. I am an anarchist when it comes to gun laws. There shouldn't be any. It's a right, and the government cannot infringe. The "reasonable" restrictions legislatures keep crapping out of their sessions infringe.

I guess I'm more specifically a 2nd Amendment anarchist...

[Mickey Rat]

Gee, I thought the fundamental right was "privacy", abortion rights were just a consequence. Privacy would be applicable to every sort of medical procedure which should make burdensome regulation suspect for all medical establishments, not just abortion mills.

[OldMexican]

Re: HazelMeade,

I hope this survives because it owuld be an AWESOME precedent for getting rid of targeted regulation of other industries. For instance GMOs, nuclear power, fracking, etc.

No, (ha ha!) it won't. This is cultural Marxism we're talking about, H. Some regulation is good, some other regulation that has same scope and justification (different target) is not. Killing baby pandas is wrong, it's evil. Killing baby humans, well...

There's nothing in the Constitution that makes murdering a human fetus a constitutional right, yet we have "interstate commerce" to make anything else a right or not a right. See how it works?