A Texas judge on Thursday granted a pregnant woman whose fetus has a lethal diagnosis permission to get an abortion despite Texas’s strict ban.
But the state is likely to appeal, and it’s unclear just how quickly the plaintiff, a 31-year-old Dallas woman named Kate Cox, will be able to obtain an abortion.
District Court Judge Maya Guerra Gamble said she would grant a temporary restraining order that allows Cox to get an abortion, while also protecting her husband from being held liable for helping her under Texas’s “bounty” law, as well as preventing her physician from being prosecuted for performing the abortion.
Cox is currently 20 weeks pregnant, and her fetus has been diagnosed with full trisomy 18, a chromosomal anomaly that leads to miscarriage, stillbirth or the death of the infant within hours, days or weeks after birth.
Cox’s doctors said carrying the pregnancy to term will force a cesarean section or induction that would inflict serious injury. Inducing labor would risk a uterine rupture because of two prior C-sections with earlier pregnancies, and another C-section at full term would risk her future fertility.
During the hearing, Cox’s attorneys said in the two days since the lawsuit was first filed, she has already needed to go to the emergency room, her fourth trip during the pregnancy.
“The idea that Ms. Cox wants desperately to be a parent and this might cause her to lose that ability is shocking, and would be a genuine miscarriage of justice,” Judge Gamble said in granting the injunction.
Texas has overlapping abortion bans. The state outlaws all abortions from the point of fertilization and also enforces a “bounty” law that rewards private citizens who sue others who have helped a person get an abortion.
There are medical exceptions to save the life of the mother, but doctors and abortion advocates argue the law is too vague on what constitutes such a risk, so physicians won’t risk providing abortions for fear of potential criminal charges or lawsuits.
The state argued Cox was not eligible for an injunction, and any injuries are merely potential and not life-threatening.
