Federal judge blocks law banning abortions based on fetal abnormalities
A federal judge in Indianapolis has blocked an Indiana abortion law that banned abortions based on genetic abnormalities of the fetus.
U.S. District Judge Tanya Walton Pratt issued a preliminary injunction on Thursday, report the Associated Press, the Indianapolis Star and the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette. The law bars abortions that are solely based on race, sex, national origin or disability of a fetus. It also requires abortion providers to inform patients about the law’s restrictions on abortion.
The law also requires fetal tissue to be disposed of in the same manner as human remains. According to AP, the law requires burial or cremation, while Planned Parenthood uses incineration.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana says in a press release that the measure, which was to take effect on July 1, was the strictest abortion law in the United States. The ACLU represents Planned Parenthood of Indiana and Kentucky in the case. North Dakota also has a law barring abortions because of genetic abnormalities, race, gender or ancestry, according to AP.
Pratt said the Indiana law interfered with a woman’s right to terminate a pregnancy before viability. “Under the state’s theory,” Pratt wrote, “a woman either wants to have or child or does not; and, once a woman chooses the former, she cannot then terminate her pregnancy for reasons the state deems improper.”
That notion, Pratt said,”is inconsistent with the notion of a right to privacy rooted in privacy concerns and a liberty right to make independent decisions.”
