AUSTIN, Texas – A Texas judge on Thursday granted permission for a pregnant woman whose fetus had a fatal diagnosis to have an abortion in an unprecedented challenge to a ban that more than a dozen states have enacted since Roe v. Wade was overturned.
The lawsuit by Kate Cox, a 31-year-old mother of two from the Dallas area, is believed to be the first time since the Supreme Court’s landmark decision last year that a woman anywhere in the country has asked a court to immediately approve an abortion.
It’s unclear how soon or whether Cox will receive the procedure.
State District Judge Maya Guerra Gamble, an elected Democrat, said she would grant a temporary restraining order that would allow Cox to have an abortion under what is a narrow exception to the Texas ban.
The decision will likely be appealed by the state, which argues that Cox does not meet the criteria for a medical exemption.
In a brief hearing Thursday, her attorney told Gamble that Cox, who is 20 weeks pregnant, went to the emergency room this week for the fourth time during her pregnancy.
Cox and her husband both attended the hearing via Zoom but did not speak in court.
A Texas judge allowed Dallas mother Kate Cox to receive an abortion due to pregnancy complications. Kate Cox/AFP via Getty Images
Doctors had told Cox that if the baby’s heartbeat stopped, inducing labor would carry the risk of rupture of the uterus due to a previous cesarean and that another C-section at full term would jeopardize her ability to conceive another child.
“The idea that Ms. Cox desperately wanted to be a parent and that this law might deprive her of that ability is shocking and would be a genuine miscarriage of justice,” Gamble said.
The Center for Reproductive Rights, which represents Cox, said the lawsuit is believed to be the first of its kind since Roe v. Wade canceled.
Since that landmark decision, Texas and 12 other states have moved to ban abortion at almost all stages of pregnancy.
The Texas Attorney General’s Office is expected to appeal the decision by State District Judge Maya Guerra Gamble. Photo by SUZANNE CORDEIRO/AFP via Getty Images
Opponents have sought to weaken the ban, including an ongoing Texas challenge to whether the state law is too restrictive for women with pregnancy complications.
“I do not want to continue the pain and suffering of this pregnancy or continue to put my body or mental health through the risk of continuing this pregnancy,” Cox wrote in an editorial published in The Dallas Morning News. “I don’t want my baby to arrive in this world only to see him suffer.”
Although Texas allows exceptions under the ban, doctors and women argue that the requirement is so vague that doctors still won’t risk providing abortions, should they face possible criminal charges or legal action.
State officials had asked Gamble to deny the request, arguing that Cox had not shown his life was in imminent danger and therefore he could not qualify for a waiver of the ban.
“There are no facts alleged to show that Ms. Cox is more at risk, let alone life-threatening, than the countless women who give birth every day with similar medical histories,” the government wrote in court filings ahead of Thursday’s hearing. .
A spokesman for Texas Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton did not immediately return a message about whether the state would appeal. Cox’s lawyers argued that the risks to his health would worsen unless the court acted quickly.
The ruling came just two days after Cox filed a lawsuit, which says doctors told her the baby would likely be stillborn or live at most a week.
Cox had a cesarean section with a previous pregnancy. She found out she was pregnant for the third time in August and was told weeks later that her baby was at high risk for a condition known as trisomy 18, which has a very high chance of miscarriage or stillbirth and a low survival rate, according to the lawsuit. .
The lawsuit was filed a week after the Texas Supreme Court heard arguments about whether the ban was too restrictive for women with pregnancy complications.
The case is among the biggest ongoing challenges to the abortion ban in the US, although a decision from the all-Republican court may not come for months.
Texas passed a ban on abortion in most cases after Roe v. Wade was overturned by the Supreme Court. AP Photo/Eric Gay, File
In July, several Texas women gave emotional testimony about carrying babies they knew would not survive and doctors were unable to offer abortions despite their worsening condition.
A judge later ruled that the Texas ban was too restrictive for women with pregnancy complications, but that decision was quickly overturned after the government appealed.
More than 40 women have received abortions in Texas since the ban took effect, according to state health figures, none of which have resulted in criminal charges.
There were more than 16,000 abortions in Texas in the five months before the ban took effect last year.
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Source: thtrangdai.edu.vn/en/
