{"id":318295,"date":"2024-09-08T11:25:21","date_gmt":"2024-09-08T16:25:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/news\/?p=318295"},"modified":"2024-09-08T20:47:19","modified_gmt":"2024-09-09T01:47:19","slug":"alaska-judge-strikes-down-law-physicians-abortions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/alaska-judge-strikes-down-law-physicians-abortions\/","title":{"rendered":"Alaska judge strikes down state law that allowed only physicians to commit abortions"},"content":{"rendered":"
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A judge has ruled in favor of Planned Parenthood, which filed a 2019 lawsuit challenging an Alaska state law that specified that only licensed physicians are permitted to commit abortions.<\/p>\n

In 2019, Planned Parenthood Great Northwest, Hawaii, Alaska, Indiana, Kentucky filed a lawsuit, arguing that non-physician healthcare providers like nurse practitioners and physicians assistants should be allowed to commit abortions. A temporary order was put in place allowing this in 2021<\/a>, until the case was formally decided.<\/p>\n

Under this ruling, non-physicians can now commit<\/a> chemical abortions, as well as surgical aspiration abortions (both most commonly used in the first trimester). Despite the claim that this is a necessary ruling for women, it actually puts them at increased risk.<\/p>\n

A 2013 study<\/a> from the Ryan Residency abortion training program at the University of California San Francisco, abortions committed by non-physicians are more likely to end in complications than those committed by physicians. With aspiration abortions, the most common complication was incomplete abortions, meaning parts of the preborn baby were left inside the mother\u2019s body. This can lead to life-threatening infection and death. The abortion pill likewise has been found to be four times more dangerous<\/a> than first trimester surgical abortions, and increases in its rate of incomplete abortions<\/a> as gestation progresses.<\/p>\n