Florida Supreme Court Allows Six-Week Abortion Ban to Go into Effect
CONTACT: Amber Gavin, amber.gavin@awomanschoiceinc.com
4.2.2024 – (STATEMENT) Yesterday, the Florida Supreme Court upheld the state’s ban on abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy flagrantly ignoring decades of established law in the state constitution. As a result, the six-week abortion ban that Governor DeSantis signed will go into effect, essentially banning abortion before many people know they are pregnant.
“Yesterday’s ruling is disastrous for our patients, for our state, and for abortion access in the Southeast,” said Kelly Flynn, President/CEO of A Woman’s Choice of Jacksonville. “Our mission at A Woman’s Choice of Jacksonville, for the last nearly 22 years, has been to ensure bodily autonomy for Floridians by providing our patients with access to compassionate, non-judgmental abortion care. With today’s decision allowing for a near-total abortion ban to go into effect, we will have to turn away patients who need abortions past the earliest stages of pregnancy forcing them to travel out-of-state for care, seek abortion outside the healthcare system, or continue pregnancies against their will. This is cruel and immoral.”
After Florida Supreme Court oral arguments in September, A Woman’s Choice of Jacksonville shared the devastating consequences of Florida’s 15-week abortion ban on the health and lives of Floridians. The 15-week ban already forced many Floridians to travel hundreds or even thousands of miles out of state for care if they could overcome the tremendous financial and logistical barriers.
Addressing the decision delivered yesterday by the Florida Supreme Court, Flynn said, “Floridians deserve access to quality, comprehensive reproductive health care, which includes abortions, and the Florida Supreme Court is denying us that fundamental right. Yesterday’s ruling adds to the already unreasonable barriers for our patients accessing care, including Florida’s 24-hour forced delay and two appointment requirements, and now a six-week abortion ban leaving an even narrower window to access care before it is too late to have an abortion in Florida. No law or judicial decision can take into account the many different circumstances in which our patients need access to abortion. These are deeply personal decisions that no one should be interfering with or making for someone else, especially not politicians.”
This November we will have the opportunity to fight back against this devastating ruling at the ballot box by voting to enshrine the right to abortion in the Florida State Constitution. It is more crucial than ever that every eligible Floridian voter to Vote Yes on Amendment 4.
A Woman’s Choice of Jacksonville remains open and ready to provide abortion care to the legal limit. If you are pregnant or think you may be pregnant in Florida and are considering abortion, seek care immediately. For any patient past the legal limit, we will refer them to clinics that can provide them with care. Call 800-298-8874 or visit awomanschoiceinc.com/appointment to request an appointment.
The American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Florida, the Center for Reproductive Rights, Planned Parenthood Federation of America, and the law firm Jenner & Block filed the case — Planned Parenthood of Southwest and Central Florida, et al. v. State of Florida, et al. — on behalf of Planned Parenthood of Southwest and Central Florida; Planned Parenthood of South, East and North Florida; Gainesville Woman Care; Indian Rocks Woman’s Center; St. Petersburg Woman’s Health Center; Tampa Woman’s Health Center; A Woman’s Choice of Jacksonville; and an individual physician plaintiff.
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A Woman’s Choice clinics are woman-owned and operated abortion clinics that offer safe, effective, and affordable medication and procedural abortion care, miscarriage management, pregnancy testing, emergency contraception, birth control, and HIV/STI testing. A Woman’s Choice has clinics in Charlotte, Greensboro, and Raleigh, NC, and Jacksonville, FL, and Danville, VA.