On January 2, the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lower court ruling stating that the Biden administration cannot force emergency room physicians to perform induced abortions. This federal lawsuit, originally filed in 2022 by the state of Texas, AAPLOG, and the Christian Medical & Dental Associations (CMDA), challenged the Biden Administration’s attempts to use the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA), which is intended to ensure that patients presenting to Medicare-participating hospitals in dire need of emergency treatment are stabilized regardless of their ability to pay, to force emergency physicians to intentionally end the lives of preborn patients on demand. The Court’s ruling was unanimous.
In a statement released shortly after the decision, AAPLOG said the following:
In an abuse of the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA), the Biden Administration previously attempted to force physicians to perform induced abortions in violation of their oath they took to never intentionally harm their patients. Induced abortion, the sole purpose of which is to end the life of our preborn patient, is not healthcare, and our members regularly treat serious pregnancy complications without it, which is entirely possible to do under existing Texas law. The Fifth Circuit’s decision to uphold the injunction against this overreach means that our members can continue to provide excellent medical care that respects the dignity of both pregnant women and their preborn children. This includes being able to perform maternal-fetal separations when a woman’s life is endangered by a pregnancy complication – something that is already allowed by EMTALA as well as by every state law in the country.
In his column for National Review, Ethics and Public Policy Center (EPPC) scholar Ed Whelan offers a robust overview of this decision. Specifically, he astutely responds to the attempt by pro-abortion advocates to frame this decision as the Court deciding that hospitals need not offer emergency treatment to pregnant women:
EMTALA does not preempt state law except in the event of a direct conflict. But Texas law “does not directly conflict with EMTALA.” EMTALA “imposes obligations on physicians with respect to both the pregnant woman and her unborn child,” and Texas law allows abortion “where there is a life-threatening condition that places the female at risk of death or ‘substantial impairment of a major bodily function’ and the physician provides the ‘best opportunity for the unborn child to survive’ unless that would create a greater risk for the pregnant female’s death or a ‘serious risk of substantial impairment of a major bodily function of the pregnant female.’” In short, “Texas law does not stand in the way of providing stabilizing treatment for a pregnant woman or the unborn child.” (Pp. 20-23.)
