Clinics to stop scheduling abortions soon
Saturday set by Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin
Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin officials say they will not schedule abortion services after Saturday in anticipation of a ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court that could overturn Roe v. Wade.
“We are anticipating that the ruling will likely come before the end of June, so we are not scheduling our typical day one/day two procedures after June 25th,” Allie Linton, an obstetrician and gynecologist and associate medical director at Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin, said in an interview with the Journal Sentinel.
Patients who seek abortions in Wisconsin need two appointments because of a law that requires a 24-hour waiting period before the procedure. The first appointment includes an ultrasound and other preparation for the procedure and the second is the abortion itself.
After the 25th, the clinics will still continue to schedule those day one preparatory procedures, Linton said, with the goal of helping navigate and support patients in any efforts to get an abortion outside of Wisconsin in the event that Roe is overturned.
That’s because without Roe in effect, Wisconsin will revert to an 1849 law that prohibits doctors from performing abortions except in cases where the procedure is necessary to save the mother’s life.
“Obviously if we are wrong and the ruling has not come out on the 27th, we will try to open up schedules and do the best that we can to get people in,” Linton added.
“Or if we’re wrong and the ruling says something different, then we will open up schedules galore.”
Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin provides abortions at three locations in the state, Milwaukee, Madison and Sheboygan.
The nation’s high court is expected to overturn Roe based on a leaked decision that shed light on the direction the court’s majority was headed. For 50 years, the decision in Roe v. Wade has provided protections around abortion access for pregnant patients.
And it doesn’t seem like Wisconsin’s 1849 law will be updated anytime soon. When Gov. Tony Evers called for a special session in the state Legislature to consider overturning the ban, he was almost immediately met with pushback from Republicans in the state Senate.
“It’s just trying to minimize trauma for our patients and staff,” Linton said.
In the clinic on Water Street in Milwaukee where she spoke with the Journal Sentinel, she said the last week of June would be spent getting staff who are willing to travel for work trained in Illinois. Others will stay and work as “Patient Navigators” to guide pregnant patients to services and resources.
In the meantime, Linton checks every news alert on her phone instantaneously, not knowing if it will be the court ruling.
“We were having to decide: at which point do you stop a procedure? If you’re in the middle of a procedure, we would finish it, because medically, that would be very dangerous,” she said.
Others would have to be turned away, which is why the organization decided to stop scheduling them after the 25th altogether. She said the thought of having to start turning patients away feels “horrendous.”
“It just feels devastating,” she said, “to know that I could help someone, and that would be the medical right thing to do – that would be what my training told me to do, and taught me to do – but that I have to deny that service.”