Over at the Constitutional Law Prof blog, Ruthann Robson (CUNY) breaks down the 8th Circuit decision in Planned Parenthood v. Rounds, upholding the constitutionality of a South Dakota statutory provision requiring the disclosure to patients seeking abortions of an “[i]ncreased risk of suicide ideation and suicide,” S.D.C.L. § 34-23A- 10.1(1)(e)(ii). Here is an excerpt from her post:
Judge Gruender’s opinion for the majority seemingly acknowledged that there was no evidence that abortion caused suicidal ideation. Instead, the issue was the “accepted usage of the term ‘increased risk’ in the relevant medical field.” The opinion found that based on the medical usage, the statutory requirement “does not imply a disclosure of a causal relationship,” instead it is merely a disclosure that “the risk of suicide and suicide ideation is higher among women who abort compared to women in other relevant groups, such as women who give birth or do not become pregnant.”
The majority rejected the relevancy of Planned Parenthood’s argument that certain underlying factors, such as pre-existing mental health problems, predispose some women both to have unwanted pregnancies and to have suicidal tendencies, resulting in a misleading correlation between abortion and suicide that has no direct causal component.
Read the rest of Professor Robson’s post here.
The court completely flubbed this one, in my opinion.
-Bridget Crawford
