{"id":311664,"date":"2024-05-02T13:35:33","date_gmt":"2024-05-02T18:35:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/news\/?p=311664"},"modified":"2024-05-03T09:35:50","modified_gmt":"2024-05-03T14:35:50","slug":"florida-6-week-law-state-clarifies-abortion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/florida-6-week-law-state-clarifies-abortion\/","title":{"rendered":"Florida 6-week pro-life law goes into effect as state clarifies what is not an abortion"},"content":{"rendered":"
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A Florida law protecting preborn children from abortion after six weeks gestation, typically when a heartbeat can be detected, has taken effect. In response, Florida’s Agency for Health Care Administration has issued guidelines on what treatments do or do not constitute abortions under the law.<\/p>\n

HB 5<\/a>, or the Reducing Fetal and Infant Mortality bill, was signed by Governor Ron DeSantis in 2022, and protected preborn children from 15 weeks gestation. An injunction was placed on the law, and though that injunction was thrown out, the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case on the law’s validity. In 2023, lawmakers signed HB 7<\/a>, or the Heartbeat Protection Act, into law, which protects children from abortion after six weeks gestation, and was written to take effect if the Supreme Court upheld HB 5.<\/p>\n

Last month, the Supreme Court ruled<\/a> that HB 5 would stand, allowing HB 7 to take effect on May 1.<\/p>\n

At fertilization<\/a>, a new human life is created, with his or her own unique DNA and traits, including hair color, eye color, and sex already determined. The heart begins beating just 21 days after fertilization, with blood actually being pumped throughout the baby’s body. Though small and reliant upon his or her mother to survive, a preborn child is a living human being, and therefore, deserving of the right to life. By the sixth week of pregnancy (four weeks following fertilization<\/a>), the brain has appeared, the two-chambered heart and circulatory system are already functioning, the large and small intestines have formed, and early eyes and upper and lower limb buds have begun to appear.<\/p>\n