After Roe Dismissed: Emergency rooms refused to treat pregnant women, leading to deaths

Since the right-leaning Supreme Court (with 3 justices appointed by Donald Trump) overturned Roe vs. Wade, hospitals and doctors are sometimes afraid to deal with pregnancies in danger. Pregnant women in conservative states have been losing their babies because of these laws passed by the Republicans who control the legislatures.  Women need to vote them out for the sake of their lives and those of their children. Here's the  story.

 

Emergency rooms refused to treat pregnant women, leaving one to miscarry in a lobby restroom

 Pregnant patients have “become radioactive to emergency departments” in states with extreme abortion restrictions.

BY AMANDA SEITZ, Associated Press, April 19, 2024

WASHINGTON (AP) — One woman miscarried in the lobby restroom of a Texas emergency room as front desk staff refused to check her in. 

Another woman learned that her fetus had no heartbeat at a Florida hospital, the day after a security guard turned her away from the facility. 

And in North Carolina, a woman gave birth in a car after an emergency room couldn’t offer an ultrasound. The baby later died.

Complaints that pregnant women were turned away from U.S. emergency rooms spiked in 2022 after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, federal documents obtained by The Associated Press reveal.

The cases raise alarms about the state of emergency pregnancy care in the U.S., especially in states that enacted strict abortion laws and sparked confusion around the treatment doctors can provide. 

Arizona just revived an 1864 law criminalizing abortion. 

Here’s what’s happening in other states “It is shocking, it’s absolutely shocking,” said Amelia Huntsberger, an OB/GYN in Oregon. “It is appalling that someone would show up to an emergency room and not receive care -- this is inconceivable.”

It’s happened despite federal mandates that the women be treated. Federal law requires emergency rooms to treat or stabilize patients who are in active labor and provide a medical transfer to another hospital if they don’t have the staff or resources to treat them. Medical facilities must comply with the law if they accept Medicare funding.

The Supreme Court will hear arguments Wednesday that could weaken those protections. The Biden administration has sued Idaho over its abortion ban, even in medical emergencies, arguing it conflicts with the federal law.

“No woman should be denied the care she needs,” Jennifer Klein, director of the White House Gender Policy Council, said in a statement. “All patients, including women who are experiencing pregnancy-related emergencies, should have access to emergency medical care required under the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA).”

PREGNANCY CARE AFTER ROE 

Pregnant patients have “become radioactive to emergency departments” in states with extreme abortion restrictions, said Sara Rosenbaum, a George Washington University health law and policy professor.

“They are so scared of a pregnant patient, that the emergency medicine staff won’t even look. They just want these people gone,” Rosenbaum said.