On Tuesday, June 3, the Trump administration announced that it would rescind guidelines to U.S. hospitals directing them to provide emergency abortions when necessary to save a woman’s life.
Under the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA)—a federal law passed in 1986—hospital emergency rooms are required to give patients life-saving and stabilizing care, including medically necessary abortions. On Tuesday, Trump revoked Biden-era guidance requiring hospitals to provide needed abortions under EMTALA even in states where abortion is illegal or restricted. The Biden administration first issued the guidance surrounding emergency abortions in 2022, just weeks after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade with the Dobbs decision.
Abortion restrictions are already associated with significantly higher risks of maternal mortality. Since Dobbs, at least 10 women have died after being denied abortions that would have saved their lives when they were suffering from miscarriages. By revoking the federal guidance allowing patients to access life-saving abortion care even in states with abortion bans, Trump is paving the way for even more women’s deaths around the country.
Since 2022, right-wing lawmakers and conservative organizations have been claiming that EMTALA doesn’t cover abortions and fighting to keep it from applying in their states. Starting in August 2022, Idaho challenged EMTALA in a case that made it to the U.S. Supreme Court. Meanwhile, in Texas, Judge Kurt D. Engelhardt of the Fifth Circuit ruled in 2024 that, “EMTALA does not provide an unqualified right for the pregnant mother to abort her child especially when EMTALA imposes equal stabilization obligations.”
As Jessica Valenti points out, this definition of “equal stabilization” implies that hospitals must treat fetuses as “equal” to pregnant patients.
This is the same logic that has led to the numerous deaths of women in abortion-ban states since 2022, when legal abortion restrictions prevent hospitals from providing abortion care, even when a fetus is nonviable, with no chance of survival, and a life-threatening pregnancy is killing the mother. Significantly, these deaths occurred even when hospitals were required to provide abortions under EMTALA, a requirement that is no longer in place with Trump’s revocation of the guidance for hospitals in states that restrict abortion.
