A 91-year-old federal judge, Howard Sachs, has granted a temporary injunction barring the State of Missouri from enforcing its abortion laws, and Planned Parenthood has quickly stepped into the breach.
One of the offending laws requires abortion doctors to have admitting privileges at nearby hospitals. The other insists that abortion clinics meet the physical specifications of surgery centers.
These common sense precautions do nothing to protect the baby, but they do at least offer the woman carrying the baby some degree of protection. Life Dynamics has posted a list of the more than two hundred women who have died while undergoing a legal abortion in the United States.
Last year, a woman undergoing an abortion at a St. Louis Planned Parenthood clinic, the only one in the state then offering abortions, had to be rushed to an emergency room after the procedure was botched. That same clinic has delivered 58 of its patients to local emergency rooms since 2009, 23 of whom experienced hemorrhaging. The pro-life group Operation Rescue determined the St. Louis Planned Parenthood clinic to be one of the two most dangerous in the country.
As KCUR reports, however, Planned Parenthood is in such haste to get things rolling that its executives have “asked Sachs to order the state to complete the abortion licensing process in 45 days.” Planned Parenthood Great Plains is moving to offer abortions in Kansas City and Columbia as soon as possible. Planned Parenthood of Southwest Missouri meanwhile plans to start aborting unborn babies in Joplin and Springfield.
In his order, Sachs said he “expects current and future licensing applications to be processed promptly, in light of patient needs, and without effective influence from opponents of abortion.” Those opponents, of course, include the people’s elected representatives.
In a prepared statement. Missouri Attorney General Josh Hawley says he is “disappointed the court has struck down important safety measures that protect the health and well-being of those women who choose to undergo an abortion. I will appeal the court’s decision and order.”