Maine governor unveils bill to protect abortion care

(The Middle Sq.) – Making certain the choice on an abortion later in being pregnant is made by a professional medical skilled and their affected person is the main focus of a brand new invoice filed by the governor.

Democratic Gov. Janet Mills, together with Senate President Troy D. Jackson, D-Allagash, and Home Speaker Rachel Talbot Ross, D-Portland, unveiled laws Tuesday that works to strengthen the state’s well being care legal guidelines. The invoice would guarantee no Maine resident is unable to obtain the reproductive care they want after they want it.

The invoice, in line with the discharge, is derived from the expertise Yarmouth resident Dana Pierce skilled in having to journey to Colorado together with her husband to acquire an abortion. She discovered “later in her being pregnant,” the discharge mentioned, her little one had a uncommon type of skeletal dysplasia.

The situation could be deadly for the kid, and embody damaged bones whereas within the womb.

“The choice to have an abortion is deeply private and, as in Dana’s case, could be heartbreaking,” Mills mentioned in a launch. “Essentially, these are choices that must be made by a lady and her medical supplier. No Maine individual ought to have to depart our state, the consolation of their household or buddies, and need to doubtlessly spend 1000’s of {dollars} simply to entry the care they want. This invoice removes boundaries to care and makes clear that, in Maine, the choice to have an abortion is for a lady and her medical supplier to make.”

If enacted, the invoice would eradicate language underneath the state’s present legal guidelines the place medical suppliers performing abortions could be topic to legal procedures underneath sure circumstances and would regulate abortion the identical as every other secure medical process.

“The proper to resolve if and when to begin a household is key to who we’re as People,” Jackson mentioned in a launch. “It’s a deeply private determination that doesn’t belong to the federal government or a politically motivated Supreme Court docket – it belongs to Mainers.”

Based on the discharge, the laws was introduced forward of Sunday’s fiftieth anniversary of Roe v. Wade, which was overturned final June.

“Abortion care is medical care, but throughout the nation elementary rights and freedoms are being taken away or restricted at an alarming fee,” Talbot Ross mentioned within the launch. “However the reverse is occurring right here in Maine. We’re serving as a light-weight that evokes others across the nation by defending those that want it and exhibiting precisely combat again. And this work is way from over. We’ll proceed to do every little thing we are able to to make sure that reproductive well being care and household planning is inexpensive and accessible in each a part of the state.”