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Seeing Through the Lies, Oklahoma Supreme Court Strikes Down Abortion Restriction
It’s been a rough few months for those of us who want to live in a reality-based world. Politicians everywhere seem to have decided that facts don’t matter, particularly when it comes to abortion. But yesterday, facts and common sense won the day in Oklahoma when the state Supreme Court struck down a law that required doctors who perform abortions to have admitting privileges at a hospital near their clinic. The Court found no evidence that these regulations would protect women’s health, as supporters of the law claimed. Instead, these medically unnecessary regulations merely make it harder for women to obtain an abortion. Had the law been enforced, only one abortion clinic would have remained open in the state. This ruling follows a decision by the United States Supreme Court in June striking down similar restrictions in the neighboring state of Texas.
For too long, politicians have enacted abortion restrictions under the guise of protecting women’s health with complete disregard for women’s actual needs. One study of the effects of abortion restrictions in Texas found that almost a quarter of the women had a hard time getting to the clinic for a consultation visit. Low-income women and women living more than 20 miles from an abortion clinic struggled the most.
Courts are starting to see through these sham laws. Politicians can no longer make up flimsy health justifications to create barriers between women and safe, legal abortion care. Evidence matters and so do women’s lives.