Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Missouri Supreme Court Allows Abortion Rights Amendment On Ballot
Kansas City Star: Missouri Abortion Rights Amendment Stays On November Ballot
Missouri voters will decide on Nov. 5 whether to overturn the state’s abortion ban after the state Supreme Court on Tuesday cleared away a final effort by anti-abortion activists to block a vote on a landmark proposal enshrining a right to abortion in the state constitution. The Missouri Supreme Court ruled that the proposed amendment to the state constitution – called Amendment 3 – will remain on the general election ballot. The decision came less than three hours before a 5 p.m. deadline to finalize the ballot. (Shorman and Bayless, 9/10)
Reuters: Republican States Ask 9th Circuit To Revive Their Bid To Limit Abortion Pill Access
A group of Republican-led states have asked the full 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals to consider their effort to impose restrictions on the abortion pill mifepristone, including a ban on prescribing it by telemedicine and dispensing it by mail. The states, led by Idaho, in a petition for en banc rehearing on Monday urged the San Francisco-based 9th Circuit to rehear their motion to intervene in, and oppose, a lawsuit by Democratic states that seeks to preserve and expand access to the drug. A three-judge panel of the court ruled in July that they do not have standing to join the case because they have not shown how they are harmed by mifepristone's availability, which the U.S. Food and Drug Administration expanded in 2021 by allowing it to be dispensed by mail. (Pierson, 9/10)
The Hill: Advocacy Groups Urge Schumer To Hold Vote On Repealing Comstock Abortion Law
A coalition of advocacy organizations sent a letter to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) this week urging him to hold a vote on a proposal aimed at guarding against a future Trump administration from reviving a long-dormant law to effectively ban abortion. The letter, which was shared exclusively with The Hill, was signed by various abortion-rights and court-reform groups. (Schonfeld, 9/10)
NBC News: Anguish, Gratitude And Fear Of Violence At A Colorado Clinic For Late Abortions
Behind bullet-proof doors in a generic office park is one of only five clinics in the country where women can access the rarest — and most controversial — abortion procedures. Women come here desperate, says Dr. Warren Hern, who has run the Boulder Abortion Clinic since 1975. “It ranges from the 12-year-old kid who’s pregnant from her stepfather to the 45-year-old woman who desperately wants to have a baby and finds out that she has a fatal illness that is incompatible with being pregnant,” he says. (Burns, Brooks and Kane, 9/10)
