Last year, one pregnant patient at the Boise-based St. Luke’s Health System in Idaho had to be airlifted for emergency care. Since January of this year, there have been six pregnant patients who have had to be airlifted out of state because physicians couldn’t provide emergency, stabilizing care typically guaranteed under the federal law known as Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA).
As Salon previously reported, OBGYNs and family medicine doctors in Idaho live in fear that they will have to deny a pregnant patient stabilizing care if it includes an abortion. If they can’t justify that the patient was close enough to death, they risk facing two to five years in prison and losing their medical license. That’s because in January, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in Texas ruled that emergency rooms aren't required to perform emergency abortions that would stabilize the health of the pregnant patient under EMTALA.
