Massachusetts teed up to legalize late-term abortions

A state bill to remove protections for unborn babies was sent to the desk of Democratic Gov. Maura Healey this week, after state legislators approved the measure late last week. The bill received final passage from the Massachusetts Senate on Friday, after the state’s House of Representatives advanced the bill the prior week.

The bill would remove the state’s law protecting unborn babies from abortion after 24 weeks gestation, shortly before the start of the third trimester. The bill would allow physicians to perform abortions deemed medically necessary based on professional medical judgment rather than legal code, according to state House legislators. The bill would also allow Massachusetts patients to abort unborn babies into the third trimester without traveling out of state, the House statement explained.

The current law already includes several exceptions allowing abortion after 24-weeks, including abortions to protect the patient's physical or mental health or in cases of a grave fetal diagnosis or anomaly. These exceptions don’t account for the large spectrum of medical situations women experience, supporters of the new legislation said.

With so many already preexisting exceptions, what would the new bill do? The new bill would remove all legal protections for unborn babies and legalize abortion at any time of pregnancy, leaving all abortion decisions up to a physician’s professional judgment. The new bill would also bar insurance companies and other third-party medical review groups from overriding joint abortion-related decisions made by a woman and her physician. Critics say the bill would also remove procedural oversight and policies governing abortion facilities by allowing providers to perform abortions outside hospitals, in so-called health care treatment centers.

The bill allowed for full term babies to be killed possibly days before birth for any or no reason, according to a Monday statement from the Massachusetts Family Institute. The law let facilities self-police, meaning abortion centers will no longer be accountable for how the abortions are carried when a baby is viable, the pro-life group noted.

WORLD reached out to Healey’s office for comment but did not receive a response prior to publication.