Kentucky Lawmakers Launch Dangerous Attack on Reproductive Care 

Frankfort, KY — Kentucky’s anti-abortion lawmakers have launched their latest attempt to insert politics into the exam room with House Bill 3, an omnibus package of anti-abortion policies that fly in the face of science. HB 3 combines some of anti-abortion extremists’ most egregious attacks on reproductive rights into a laundry list of onerous and irresponsible requirements for abortion providers and patients.

Planned Parenthood Alliance Advocates (PPAA) denounces HB 3, a dangerous and harmful bill that maliciously promotes medical misinformation. HB 3 does nothing to improve patient care or outcomes. The sole impact of these policies will be to make it difficult, and often impossible, for people to access essential, time-sensitive care. 

As other states push to increase access to essential services by removing obstacles to care, Kentucky legislators are working around the clock to chip away at a person’s right to make informed medical decisions for themselves and their families. In addition to restricting access to safe and effective medication abortion, this bill would further limit telemedicine; make it even more difficult for young people to access abortion care, effectively putting abortion out of reach for some young people; and require providers lie to patients about so-called “abortion reversal,” an experimental, unproven procedure with no basis in science.

“Kentucky residents deserve lawmakers who fight to protect and strengthen their health care system, not undermine it with junk science and medical misinformation,” said Tamarra Wieder, Kentucky State Director for PPAA. “HB 3 is not only unconstitutional, but irresponsible and out of step with what Kentuckians want: access to medically accurate information and essential medical procedures like abortion.” 

The key components of the bill include: 

• Restricting access to safe, effective medication abortion, ignoring current medical and scientific guidance;

• Publishing the names of all physicians that provide medication abortion and creating a state-run “complaint portal” that would allow any member of the public to submit anonymous complaints about abortion providers, opening them up to increased harassment from anti-abortion extremists;

• Creating a redundant and onerous FDA-like certification program under the state Board of Pharmacy targeting medication abortion drugs that would require drug manufacturers, distributors, and pharmacies to register and certify with the state. This would be an unprecedented oversight of a drug regimen with a proven safety record.

• Undermining the judicial bypass process for minors who are seeking an abortion by adding a waiting period for some youth and creating administrative requirements that will be impossible for some youth to fulfill;

• Prohibiting health care facilities from safely and respectfully handling fetal remains in accordance with accepted medical standards and practice; 

• Requiring the state to promote the fraudulent idea that medication abortion can be reversed; and

• Expanding existing restrictions that prohibit public funding from being given to any institution that performs, refers for, or counsels about abortions.

In combination, these policies represent an egregious assault on abortion care, with the ultimate goal of eliminating Kentuckians’ constitutional right to safe, legal abortion. 

“Year after year, Kentuckians watch politicians debate our right to access medically necessary and time-sensitive health care, and create laws for our bodies based not on science, but on a need for control,” Wieder continued. “Health care champions in every elected office have a responsibility to stand up to misinformation, fearmongering, and inflammatory rhetoric, not promote it. Abortion is still safe and legal in Kentucky, and we will continue to do everything in our power to keep it that way.” 

 

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Planned Parenthood Alliance Advocates, Serving AK, HI, ID, IN, KY, WA (PPAA) is an independent, nonprofit, nonpartisan organization educating residents and policymakers about reproductive health issues in Alaska, Hawai‘i, Idaho, Indiana, Kentucky and Washington. PPAA lobbies and educates to advance Planned Parenthood's mission, and engages in limited electoral activities.