#RFKJr didn’t answer the question, saying he thinks he only has authority over the budgetary provisions of #EMTALA.
“I don’t know. I mean the answer that is, I don’t know,” Kennedy finally responded.
This has been a major debate in #health #policy, reaching #SCOTUS last year. (The court mostly punted on the case.) The Biden admin argued that federal #law preempts state law for emergency #abortions.
#HHS can influence whether #hospitals provide #abortion in emergency situations. The Biden admin issued guidance saying that #EMTALA’s requirements that hospitals provide emergency medical care also mean hospitals should provide abortion in cases where a woman’s health or life were at risk. Sen Cortez Masto asked #RFKJr if he believes that EMTALA protects a woman’s right to have an emergency abortion if her #health is threatened, in the case of an incomplete miscarriage, for example.
#law #USpol
#RFKJr is clearly flustered by this exchange. His go-to response when challenged about his about-face seems to be simply that he agrees w/ #Trump that “every abortion is a tragedy”
Sen Catherine Cortez-Masto, (D), trips RFKJr up on a question about #EMTALA, the federal #law that requires hospitals that receive #Medicare funding to provide emergency care to anyone in a life-threatening crisis—including #abortions for pregnant women. RFKJr confesses he does not know what authority he would have.
#Abortion rights groups & #medical experts called the #Idaho decision a preliminary victory that did not settle the broader question of whether a federal emergency-care #law preempts strict state #AbortionBans.
In both Idaho & #Texas, the #Biden admin asserted that federal law #EMTALA mandates emergency abortion care when it is the only treatment that can save a pregnant woman’s life or prevent serious harm to her health, including…organ failure or loss of fertility.
#EMTALA needs to be strengthened and expanded to provide a more robust firewall against these draconian state laws.
#VoteBlue in all races to give #HarrisWalz the House and Senate majorities needed to stop #SCOTUS and #TX from controlling women’s bodies.
The Georgia hospital that failed to save #Amber #Thurman
may have broken a federal law
when doctors there waited 20 hours to perform a procedure criminalized by the state’s abortion ban,
according to Sen. Ron Wyden, chair of the Senate Finance Committee.
The Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, or #EMTALA, requires hospitals to provide emergency care to stabilize patients who need it
— or transfer them to a hospital that can.
Passed nearly four decades ago, the law applies to any hospital with an emergency department and that accepts Medicare funding,
which includes the one Thurman went to, Piedmont Henry in suburban Atlanta.
The finance committee has authority over the regulatory agency that enforces the law.
In a letter sent Monday, Wyden, an Oregon Democrat, cites ProPublica’s investigation into Thurman’s #death,
which was found #preventable by a state committee of maternal health experts.
The senator’s letter asks Piedmont CEO David Kent whether the hospital has delayed or denied emergency care to pregnant patients since Georgia’s abortion ban went into effect. (Kent did not respond to requests for comment.)
“It is my duty to conduct oversight of potential violations of patients’ rights under these laws,” Wyden wrote.
The senator asked for the hospital’s policies covering treatment of patients with emergencies that require abortion care.
He also asked for a list of personnel involved in making those decisions.
He gave the hospital a deadline of Oct. 24 to provide those and other requested records and answers.
Wyden sent the same letter citing ProPublica’s reporting on Thurman to seven hospitals in North Carolina, Florida, Missouri, Louisiana and Texas.
One letter seeks information from a Texas hospital where Yeniifer Alvarez-Estrada Glick died in 2022 from complications of pregnancy including hypertension, as reported by The New Yorker.
Other letters seek information from hospitals where women have reportedly been turned away or experienced delayed care.
The hospitals’ answers could lead to proposed legislation or executive actions to strengthen compliance.
The federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services investigates complaints and can take actions including levying fines against hospitals that violate EMTALA.
Wyden’s committee plans to hold a hearingon Tuesday,
saying in a news release it will “examine how Donald Trump’s successful overturn of Roe v. Wade and subsequent state abortion bans have threatened access to life-saving medical care for women nationwide.”
https://www.propublica.org/article/amber-thurman-georgia-abortion-wyden-emtala
Did a #Georgia #Hospital Break Federal Law When It Failed to Save #AmberThurman? A #Senate Committee Chair Wants Answers.
—
Thurman died after waiting 20 hours for emergency care under the state’s #abortion ban. Sen. Ron Wyden demanded records his committee could review to determine whether the hospital violated the law. “It’s not even a question,” one expert said.
https://www.propublica.org/article/amber-thurman-georgia-abortion-wyden-emtala
Dozens of pregnant women, some bleeding or in labor, being turned away from ERs despite federal law #EMTALA
https://apnews.com/article/pregnant-women-emergency-room-ectopic-er-edd66276d2f6c412c988051b618fb8f9
EMTALA was put through the Senate in the 80s (by Bob Dole of all people) as a means of ensuring that in-need individuals got lifesaving care. I’m not sure what he imagined for later but what we have is a radical GOP almost 40 years later trying to force their abortion agenda all of us.
All I know it’s that I’m voting for the administration that supports patient rights. #EMTALA #SCOTUS #abortion
Biden-Harris Administration Reaffirms Commitment to EMTALA Enforcement-
https://www.hhs.gov/about/news/2024/07/02/biden-harris-administration-reaffirms-commitment-emtala-enforcement.html
Today's #SCOTUS ruling in the #Idaho #EMTALA #abortion case is a con job to help CONVICTED FELON Trump in #BidenTrumpDebates [he'll claim he protects women] & it puts off an unpopular abortion case until after #2024Elections.
Then if bonkers Trump wins, #Project2025 will kill EMTALA!
Right-wing SCOTUS thought it could easily con American women. Don't be fooled!
Moyle v. Idaho officially released
https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/23pdf/23-726_6jgm.pdf
Dismissed as improvidently granted and Court's stays vacated
Kagan: I concur in the Court’s decision today to vacate its stay
and dismiss the writ of certiorari before judgment as improvidently granted. I do so because Idaho’s arguments
about EMTALA do not justify, and have never justified, either emergency relief or our early consideration of this dispute.
“So, as of today, the Court has not adopted #Idaho's farfetched theories-but it has not rejected them either.
“Instead, the Court puts off the decision. But how long must pregnant patients wait…? Until we confront the pending petition…the Govt filed w/us after the #FifthCircuit enabled Texas's flouting of #EMTALA? Until these very cases return to us in a few yrs? Will this Court…have a do-over, rehearing & rehashing the same arguments…,just at a comparatively more convenient point in time?
5/
“Despite clarity of the #legal issue & the dire need for an answer…,today 6 Justices refuse to recognize the rights #EMTALA protects.…The majority opts, instead, to dismiss these cases. But storm clouds loom….3 Justices suggest…that #States have free rein to nullify #FederalLaw.…& 3 more decline to disagree w/those dissenters on the #merits.…The latter group offers only…that 'petitioners have raised a difficult & consequential argument' about Congress's authority under the Spending Clause.…
4/
Here is a copy of the *accidentally* posted #SCOTUS ruling on #MoyleVUnitedStates - the case on whether an #Idaho #abortion #law conflicts w/ the federal Emergency Medical Treatment & Active Labor Act (#EMTALA)
https://assets.bwbx.io/documents/users/iqjWHBFdfxIU/rJo5436tVr08/v0
Justice #KetanjiBrownJackson’s opinion, concurring in part & dissenting in part, begins on p8.