New Abortion Chaos in the ER
  June 5, 2025 Greetings, Meteor readers, My two loves, Aryna Sabalenka and Coco Gauff, will be facing off at the French Open this weekend. While I cannot decide who to root for, Gauff taking the trophy would be historic, as an American has not won the French Open in a decade. I’m willing to be pro-America this one time.  In today’s newsletter, we try to wrap our heads around the Trump administration’s latest anti-abortion move. Plus, your weekend reading. Bonne nuit, Shannon Melero  WHAT’S GOING ONThe chaos is the point: On Tuesday, the Trump administration rescinded guidance the Biden administration had issued in 2022 explicitly stating that hospitals are to provide abortion care to patients in emergency medical situations, even if the hospital is located in a state with an abortion ban. The guidance came just as news of desperately ill pregnant women being turned away from hospitals was beginning to emerge, and it clarified the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act (EMTALA), a 1986 law that requires hospitals receiving federal funding to provide stabilizing care for any individual experiencing a medical emergency. This week, the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services said in a statement that the 2022 guidance did “not reflect the policy of this administration” and that it would “work to rectify any perceived legal confusion and instability created by the former administration’s actions.” Which is ironic, because the thing currently creating massive confusion among providers, patients, and the media is the rescission of the guidance, not the guidance itself. Allow us to clarify: EMTALA has not been repealed; it is still the law of the land and, should you need care in an emergency, your nearest hospital is obligated to provide it or to transfer you to a facility that can—yes, even if that care includes an abortion. “I want patients to know that nobody should be denying you care because of this memo,” Dr. Dara Kass, a former regional director at the Department of Health and Human Services and an emergency physician in New York, tells The Meteor. And if you do think your providers violated EMTALA, she notes, you can still issue a complaint. So what’s the purpose of the memo, if it doesn’t change the law? Trump may just be looking for a way to pay lip service to the anti-abortion movement. And the memo’s specific language may also be strategic, as Jessica Valenti points out in her newsletter: The CMS memo says EMTALA still requires treatment of “emergency medical conditions that place the health of a pregnant woman or her unborn child in serious jeopardy.” The phrase “unborn child” (which also appears in EMTALA) hints at fetal personhood and sets up a showdown between a woman who has a life-threatening condition, like an ectopic pregnancy, and her fetus. It’s all very chaotic. And chaos is the point. “This action doesn’t change hospitals’ legal obligations,” Fatima Goss Graves, president of the National Women’s Law Center, said in a statement, “but it does add to the fear, confusion, and dangerous delays patients and providers have faced since the fall of Roe v. Wade.” Dr. Kass adds that while the 2022 guidance “signaled to doctors that the government had their back,” the rescission tells doctors, “You’re on your own” and erodes their confidence that the government will protect them. There will inevitably be more “physicians who are not sure what they’re allowed to do,” she says, “and therefore they might do less.” Meanwhile, more pregnant patients will suffer as doctors are forced to contend with legal quandaries under pressure. We’ve already seen what happens when emergency rooms are slow to act; Amanda Zurowski, Kaitlyn Joshua, and Amber Nicole Thurman have each paid the price for a hospital’s confusion over what doctors are allowed to do—Thurman with her life. For better or worse, Dr. Kass doesn’t see this latest move as dramatically changing “the care on the ground.” (Indeed, even with the 2022 guidance in place, there have been dozens of documented cases of pregnant women being denied emergency care or treated negligently.) Rather, she sees this as “a distraction from what we need to do—which is to reinstate access to abortion services in every state.” —Shannon Melero and Nona Willis Aronowitz AND:
 IT’S BACONEGGANDCHEESE YOU CRETIN.
 WEEKEND READING 📚On mothers and daughters: Molly Jong-Fast unflinchingly traces the mental decline of her mother, iconic feminist novelist Erica Jong, in this excerpt from Jong-Fast’s memoir How to Lose Your Mother, which came out last week. (Vanity Fair) On always being here: It’s time to learn about the key trans figures in history that get cut out from school lessons. (Erin Reed in the Morning) On Dyke Day: How a beloved Pride tradition stays alive without being beholden to flipflopping corporate sponsors. (LA Public Press) On beauty: Meteor collective member Raquel Willis reminds us that, against all odds, trans people are here to stay and will still be “seen in all of our glory.” (Atmos)  FOLLOW THE METEOR     Thank you for reading The Meteor! Got this from a friend? |
