The US state of Texas sued a female doctor from New York named Dr Margaret Daley Carpenter for allegedly mailing abortion pills to a woman in Dallas despite the ban on the procedure in the state.
The lawsuit, filed on Thursday (Dec 12), alleged that Dr Carpenter sent abortion pills to a 20-year-old woman via telemedicine. It further said that in July, the woman sought medical attention after severe bleeding, which led to the “biological father of the unborn child” suspecting that she tried to end her pregnancy. He later found abortion pills.
The lawsuit was filed by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and will make laws of two states (New York and Texas) against each other.
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Since Dr Carpenter is based in New York, Paxton’s lawsuit comes under New York’s “shield laws”, which defend doctors providing abortion medication to people across state lines.
The lawsuit further claimed that since Dr Carpenter does not hold Texas medical licensing, her prescriptions of the pills were unauthorised.
The woman conceived in mid-May, as per the suit, and did not have any life-threatening conditions from the pregnancy. The case detailed that the woman experienced severe bleeding on July 16 and was hospitalised. Her boyfriend was unaware of her plans to abort their baby.
The case will mark the first time “shield laws” are tested in court.
Mary Ziegler, a University of California, Davis, school of law professor who studies the legal history of reproduction, told The Guardian, “This was inevitable”.
“The goal, I think in part, is to intimidate physicians by saying: ‘We’re coming for you’,” she further added.
Dr Carpenter sent two drugs named Mifepristone and Misoprostol that are used in United States abortions to end pregnancies in the first trimester and are safe to use. The lawsuit said the woman’s pregnancy ended at nine weeks.
In a statement, Paxton said, “In Texas, we treasure the health and lives of mothers and babies, and this is why out-of-state doctors may not illegally and dangerously prescribe abortion-inducing drugs to Texas residents”.
(With inputs from agencies)