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October 8, 2024 – 01:08
Washington, Oct 7 (EFE).- The United States Supreme Court refused this Monday to intervene in a legal dispute between the Government of Joe Biden and Texas, allowing the state to prohibit abortions even in emergency cases.
The Supreme Court justices refused to review a lower court ruling that blocked a Health Department order requiring health centers to offer this procedure in emergency rooms.
The decision by the highest US judicial body comes less than a month before the presidential elections on November 5, in which the right to abortion is one of the key issues among voters both in the southern state and nationally.
In early 2022, several women sued the state of Texas because they were denied access to abortion even though the fetuses were nonviable. Some even suffered serious health consequences since doctors decided to wait for the fetus’s heart to stop beating, as required by law.
Texas has one of the strictest abortion bans in the country, starting at six weeks and with exceptions only when the pregnant woman’s life is at risk.
Within the framework of this appeal to the Supreme Court, on November 20, an amicus curiae (friend of the court) brief was presented on behalf of 40 leading Texas companies and individuals in support of the plaintiffs’ position.
The report argues that uncertainties surrounding abortion bans in Texas are having a negative impact on the state’s economy, with an estimated $14.5 billion in lost revenue each year.
The ban on abortion in Texas after five weeks came into effect in September 2021, a few months after the Supreme Court overturned the so-called ‘Roe against Wade’ ruling that had protected the right to abortion at the federal level for five decades.
As of today, and according to data from the Guttmacher Institute, access to abortion has been partially or totally eliminated in 41 US states, including Texas, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Kentucky and North Carolina. EFE
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