Biden administration says doctors must offer abortion if mother's life is at risk
CBSN
The Biden administration on Monday told hospitals that they "must" provide abortion services if the life of the mother is at risk, stating that federal law on emergency treatment guidelines preempts state laws in jurisdictions that now ban the procedure without any exceptions following the Supreme Court's decision to end a constitutional right to abortion.
The Department of Health and Human Services cited requirements on medical facilities in the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA). The law requires medical facilities to determine whether a person seeking treatment may be in labor or whether they face an emergency health situation — or one that could develop into an emergency — and to provide treatment.
"If a physician believes that a pregnant patient presenting at an emergency department is experiencing an emergency medical condition as defined by EMTALA, and that abortion is the stabilizing treatment necessary to resolve that condition, the physician must provide that treatment," the agency's guidance states. "When a state law prohibits abortion and does not include an exception for the life of the pregnant person — or draws the exception more narrowly than EMTALA's emergency medical condition definition — that state law is preempted."
Actor Richard Dreyfuss is facing backlash for allegedly sharing remarks that audience members found sexist, homophobic and generally offensive at a Q&A event over the weekend tied to a Massachusetts theater's screening of "Jaws." Dreyfuss starred in the 1975 blockbuster that was filmed in Massachusetts and screened Saturday night at The Cabot, a performing arts center in the coastal community of Beverly.
Another American who was arrested in the Turks and Caicos Islands for possessing ammunition was sentenced to time served and a $9,000 fine on Tuesday, local media reported. Tyler Wenrich was facing a potential mandatory minimum sentence of 12 years in prison for ammunition charges in the British territory.