Kate Cox, a thirty-one-year-old woman with an unborn baby, was denied a request by the Texas Supreme Court to undergo abortion despite the risk to her life and fertility. (Image: Reuters)
Kate Cox, who has two children, said her unborn baby was diagnosed with trisomy 18, a fatal genetic condition that can lead to loss of Kate’s fertility.
The Texas supreme court late Friday evening blocked the emergency abortion for a pregnant woman whose foetus was determined to be not viable. Kate Cox, a 31 mother of two, earlier won the district judge’s approval for the procedure but Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton petitioned the high court to stop the process.
Texas, the conservative southern state, is known for having some of the most restrictive abortion laws in the country. The recent case from Texas showed how the state and the US remains divided on abortion and the right to choose.
Cox and her doctors argued that a fatal genetic condition was diagnosed in her unborn baby – trisomy 18 – and it could lead to the loss of her fertility if she is not allowed an abortion.
This Thursday Texas district judge Maya Guerra Gamble ruled that Cox should be allowed to go ahead with the abortion under a medical exception provision in Texas’s abortion laws which is triggered when the woman’s health is at risk.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton then petitioned the Texas high court to block the lower court’s decision but on Friday, the Supreme Court ordered a stay.
The Texas suit is among the many brought before the Supreme Court after it overturned Roe v. Wade, the case that granted a constitutional right to abortion five decades ago.
Cox was represented by the Center for Reproductive Rights who claimed that the case was the first time in which a woman asked a court for an emergency abortion since Roe v. Wade in 1973.
Texas bars abortion after six weeks of pregnancy and the case has heightened the debate about medical exceptions in Texas. The Texas attorney general lashed out at district court judge Maya Guerra Gamble for giving Cox the green light, claiming she “abused her discretion” by deeming that Cox qualified for the exception.
Texas also punished “collaborators” who helped perform an abortion. The lawsuit filed by Cox seeks to protect her husband and Dr. Damla Karsan who examined Cox and offered her assistance.
Physicians say that even though Texas allows abortions in cases where the mother’s life could be at risk the wording of the law is unclear and the doctors risk serious legal consequences.
Paxton also sent letters to hospitals on Thursday and warned them of legal consequences they could face if they performed an abortion. Texas doctors guilty of performing illegal abortions face up to 99 years in prison, fines of up to $100,000 and revocation of their medical licence.
(with inputs from Politico, Houston Chronicle, the New York Times and CNN)
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