A judge in the southern state of Georgia struck down a strict state abortion law introduced after the Supreme Court ended the constitutional right to abortion in 2022. The Georgia judge ruled that the abortion ban after six weeks of pregnancy—when many women still do not realize they are pregnant—was incompatible with women’s right to control their own bodies.
First modification: 01/10/2024 – 07:47
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A judge of Georgia on Monday overturned the state’s abortion law, which went into effect in 2022 and effectively banned abortions beyond about six weeks of pregnancy.
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney wrote in his order that “freedom in Georgia includes in its meaning, in its protections, and in its package of rights the power of a woman to control her own body, to decide what happens to him and in him, and to reject the interference of the State in his health care options.
When the Supreme Court of USA overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, ending the national right to abortion, opening the door to state bans. Fourteen states now prohibit abortion at all stages of pregnancy, with some exceptions. Georgia It was one of those four in which the ban took effect after the first six weeks of pregnancy, which is usually before women realize they are pregnant.
The impact of the bans has been deeply felt in the South, as Many people have to travel hundreds of miles to reach states where they can legally obtain an abortion.
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The Georgia law was passed by state lawmakers and signed by Republican Gov. Brian Kemp in 2019, but had been blocked from going into effect until the Supreme Court overturned the case. Roe vs. Wadewhich had protected the right to abortion for almost 50 years.
The law prohibited most abortions once a “detectable human heartbeat” existed. Cardiac activity can be detected by ultrasound in the cells of an embryo that will eventually become the heart around six weeks of pregnancy.
McBurney wrote that his ruling means the law in the state reverts to what it was before the law was passed in 2019.
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“When a fetus growing inside a woman reaches viability, when society can assume the care and responsibility for that separate life, then – and only then – can society intervene,” McBurney wrote.
An “arbitrary six-week ban” on abortions “is inconsistent with these rights and the proper balance that a workable rule establishes between a woman’s rights to liberty and privacy and society’s interest in protecting and caring for unborn babies.” born,” the order says.
This article is adapted from his original in english
