| Heartbeat Bill Passes, Will be Signed by Governor Tomorrow
The heartbeat bill, House File 732, prohibits an elective abortion after a fetal heartbeat is detected by abdominal ultrasound, unless there is a medical emergency or a legal exception. These legal exceptions include if the pregnancy is the result of rape or incest, or if the unborn child has a fetal abnormality and will not survive outside the womb. The Governor plans to sign this bill tomorrow, Friday, July 14th.
Since the Dobbs ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court there have been many misconceptions about laws in Iowa but also throughout the United States that seek to protect the unborn. Iowans can be assured that HF 732 does not impact care provided to women experiencing a miscarriage or having complications with her pregnancy.
Miscarriage is clearly not prohibited in anyway in this bill. The definition of abortion in the bill is “the termination of a human pregnancy with the intent other than to produce a live birth or to remove a dead fetus.” Additionally, the legal exceptions include “any spontaneous abortion, commonly known as a miscarriage, if not all of the products of conception are expelled.”
Medical emergency is defined broadly to include any situation in which an abortion is performed to preserve the life of the pregnant woman whose life is endangered, and when the pregnancy creates a serious risk of substantial and irreversible impairment of a major bodily function.
Lastly, this bill does not have criminal or civil penalties against women or physicians. Rather, it leaves the rulemaking to the Iowa Board of Medicine, which will then by approved or rejected by the legislatures Administrative Rules Review Committee. |
