A Texas judge on Thursday granted an emergency order allowing a pregnant woman whose fetus has a fatal diagnosis to get an abortion in the state.
Late last month, Kate Cox, a 31-year-old Dallas-area mother of two who is about 20 weeks pregnant, found out that her developing fetus has trisomy 18, a rare chromosomal disorder likely to cause stillbirth or the death of the baby shortly after it’s born.
Texas law prohibits almost all abortions with very limited exceptions. So on behalf of Cox, her husband and her doctor, lawyers with the Center for Reproductive Rights filed a request for a temporary restraining order that would block the state’s abortion bans in Cox’s case and enable her to terminate her pregnancy.
“Kate Cox’s life and future fertility are at great risk, and according to her doctor, the medical care that she needs is an abortion,” Molly Duane, a senior staff attorney at the Center for Reproductive Rights, said in the hearing.
Cox’s two children were delivered by Cesarean section, so carrying this pregnancy to term and getting a third C-section could put her at risk “for multiple serious medical conditions such as uterine rupture and hysterectomy,” the center said on Tuesday when it announced the lawsuit.
Duane said during the hearing that Cox was “at high risk for multiple pregnancy complications including hypertension, gestational diabetes and infection,” and that within the last two days, she had to visit an emergency room for a fourth time “for pregnancy symptoms including severe cramps leaking fluid and elevated vital signs.”
“Many of Miss Cox’s health risks during this pregnancy will put her life in danger if left untreated, and carrying this pregnancy to term will significantly increase the risks to her future fertility, meaning that she and her husband may not be able to have more children in the future,” Duane said.
Judge Maya Guerra Gamble quickly granted the requested order.
“The idea that Miss Cox wants desperately to be a parent, and this law might actually cause her to lose that ability is shocking and would be a genuine miscarriage of justice,” the judge said.
Johnathan Stone, an attorney with the Texas attorney general’s office who represented the state in the hearing, argued that Cox and her husband had not sufficiently demonstrated that they would suffer “immediate and irreparable injury” without an abortion. Stone pushed instead for an evidentiary hearing, saying an emergency court order would enable the couple to get an abortion that “can’t be undone” before the court could fully consider the evidence.
Neither the Texas attorney general’s office nor the state’s medical board immediately responded to a request for comment about the judge’s decision.
Maria Piñero and Natalie Obregon contributed.
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